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THE WOMAN WHO DARED. 



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THE WOMAN WHO DARED. 



THE 



WOMAN WHO DARED, 



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Qyuo.cL 



EPES SARGENT. 



" Honest liberty is the greatest foe to dishonest license." 

John Milton. 



BOSTON: - 
ROBERTS BROTHERS 

1870. 



7'5 * 
,Y 



nnn 



.W 



Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1869, by 

EPES SARGENT, 

in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts. 



University Press : Welch, Bigelovv, & Co., 

Cambridge. 



J 



To 



^PI^/NG saw my little venture just begun j 

And the Ji your hospitable message came, 
Inviting nie to taste the strawberries 
At Strawberry Hill. I went. How lojtg I stayed, 
Urged by dear friends and the restoring breeze, 
Let me not say j long enough to co7nplete 
My rhythmic strtccturej day by day it gi'ew, 
And all sweet influejices helped its growth. 
The lawn sloped green and ample till the trees 
Met on its margin; and the Hudson^ s tide 
Rolled beautiful beyond, where purple gleatns 
Fell on the Palisades or touched the hills 
Of the opposing shore j for all without 
Was but an e7nblem of the sy7n7netry 
Ifou7td withi7t, where love held perfect sway, 
With taste a7id beauty a7id do77iestic peace 
For its allies. 

We do 7iot praise the rose, 
Si7ice all who see it k7iow it is the rosej 
And so, dear lady, p7'aise of thee would see7n, 



vi Dedication. 

To all who know thee, quite superfluous. 
But if from any of these thoughts be shed 
A tight of the fragrance and the hue of truth, 
To thee I dedicate the trajisient flower 
hi which the eternal beauty reappears; 
Knowing, should poison mingle with the sweet, 
Thou, like the eclectic bee, with instinct sure. 
Wilt take the good alone, and leave the bad. 



E. S. 






CONTENTS. 



Page 

I. Overture , . . c < • • » ^ 
II. The Father's Story . . . ^ • 7 

III. The Mother's Story « 39 

Linda's Lullaby .....•• 4i 

IV. Paradise Found 93 

The Mother's Hymn ^°° 

V. Linda 

Help me, dear Chords . . ' ' ^43 

147 

177 



Be of good Cheer " ^^7 



VI. By the Seaside . . . • « 

Linda's Song ,.•••' 

Under the Pines ^°^ 

211 

VII. From Linda's Diary 

VIII. From Meredith's Diary . . o . 235 

... 249 
IX. Beside the Lake 



263 
Notes 



^ 



THE WOMAN WHO DARED. 



I. 

OVERTURE. 

T) LEST Power that canst transfigure common 

things, 
And, like the sun, make the clod burst in 

bloom, — 
Unseal the fount so mute this many a day. 
And help me sing of Linda ! Why of her. 
Since she would shrink with manifest recoil, 
Knew she that deeds of hers were made a theme 



2 The Woman who Dared. 

For measured verse? Why leave the garden 

flowers 
To fix the eye on one poor violet 
That on the solitary grove sheds fragrance ? 
Themes are enough, that court a wide regard, 
And prompt a strenuous flight ; and yet from all, 
My thoughts come back to Linda. Let me spare, 
As best I may, her modest privacy. 
While under Fancy's not inapt disguise 
I give substantial truth, and deal with no 
Unreal beings or fantastic facts : 
Bear witness to it, Linda ! 

Now while May 
Keeps me a restive prisoner in the house. 
For the first time the Spring's unkindness ever 
Held me aloof from her companionship, 
However roughly from the east her breath 
Came as if all the icebergs of Grand Bank 
Were giving up their forms in that one gust, — 



Overture, 3 

Now while on orchard-trees the struggling blos- 
soms 
Break from the varnished cerements, and in clouds 
Of pink and white float round the boughs that hold 
Their verdure yet in check, — and while the lawn 
Lures from yon hemlock hedge the robin, plump 
And copper-breasted, and the west wind brings 
Mildness and balm, — let me attempt the task 
That also is a pastime. 

What though Spring 
Brings not of Youth the wonder and the zest ; 
The hopes, the day-dreams, and the exultations ? 
The animal life whose overflow and waste 
Would far out-measure now our little hoard ? 
The health that made mere physical existence 
An ample joy ; that on the ocean beach 
Shared with the leaping waves their breezy glee ; 
That in deep woods, or in forsaken clearings. 
Where the charred logs were hid by verdure new. 



4 The Woman who Dared, 

And the shy wood-thrush lighted ; or on hills 
Whence counties lay outspread beneath our 

gaze; 
Or by some rock-girt lake where sandy margins 
Sloped to the mirrored tints of waving trees, — 
Could feel no burden in the grasshopper, 
And no unrest in the long summer day ? 
Would I esteem Youth's fervors fair return 
For temperate airs that fan sublimer heights 
Than Youth could scale; heights whence the 

patient vision 
May see this life's harsh inequalities, 
Its rudimental good and full-blown evil, 
Its crimes and earthquakes and insanities. 
And all the wrongs and sorrows that perplex 

us. 

Assume, beneath the eternal calm, the order 
Which can come only from a Love Divine ? 
A love that sees the good beyond the evil, 
The serial life beyond the eclipsing death — 



Overture. 5 

That tracks the spirit through eternities, 

Backward and forward, and in every germ 

Beholds its past, its present, and its future, 

At every stage beholds it gravitate 

Where it belongs, and thence new-born emerge 

Into new life and opportunity, 

An outcast never from the assiduous Mercy, 

Providing for His teeming universe. 

Divinely perfect not because complete, 

But because incomplete, advancing ever 

Beneath the care Supreme ? — heights whence 

the soul, 
Uplifted from all speculative fog, 
All darkening doctrine, all confusing fear. 
Can see the drifted plants, can scent the odors. 
That surely come from that celestial shore 
To which we tend ; however out of reckoning, 
Swept wrong by Error's currents. Passion's 

storms. 
The poor tossed bark may be ? 



6 The Woman who Dared, 

Descend, my thoughts ! 
Your theme lies lowly as the ground-bird's nest ; 
Why seek, with wings so feeble and unused. 
To soar above the clouds and front the stars ? 
Descend from your high venture, and to scenes 
Of the heart's common history come down ! 



II. 

THE FATHER'S STORY. 

'T^HE little mansion had its fill of sunshine ; 
The western windows overlooked the 
Hudson 
Where the great city's traffic vexed the tide ; 
The front received the Orient's early flush. 
Here dwelt three beings, who the neighbors said 
Were husband, wife, and daughter ; and indeed 
There was no sign that they were otherwise. 
Their name was Percival ; they lived secluded, 
Saw no society, except some poor 



8 The Woman who Dared, 

Old pensioner who came for food or help ; 

Though, when fair days invited, they would take 

The omnibus and go to see the paintings 

At the Academy ; or hear the music 

At opera or concert ; then, in summer, 

A visit to the seaside or the hills 

Would oft entice them. 

Percival had reached 
His threescore years and five, but stood erect 
As if no touch of age had chilled him yet. 
Simple in habit, studious how to live 
In best conformity with laws divine, — 
Impulsive, yet by trial taught to question 
All impulses, affections, appetites, 
At Reason's bar, — two objects paramount 
Seemed steadily before him ; one, to find 
The eternal truth, showing the constant right 
In politics, in social life, in morals, — 
The other, to apply all love and wisdom 
To education of his child — of Linda. 



The Fathers Story, 9 

Yet, if with eye anointed, you could look 

On that benign and tranquil countenance. 

You might detect the lines which Passion leaves 

Long after its volcano is extinct 

And flowers conceal its lava. Percival 

Was older than his consort, twenty years ; 

Yet were they fitly mated ; though, with her, 

Time had dealt very gently, leaving face 

And rounded form still youthful, and unmarred 

By one uncomely outline ; hardly mingling 

A thread of silver in her chestnut hair 

That affluent needed no deceiving braid. 

Framed for maternity the matron seemed : 

Thrice had she been a mother ; but the children, 

The first six winters of her union brought, 

A boy and girl, were lost to her at once 

By a wall's falling on them, as they went. 

Heedless of danger, hand in hand, to school. 

To either parent terrible the blow ! 

But, three years afterward, when Linda came. 



10 The Woman who Dared. 

With her dark azure eyes and golden hair, 

It was as if a healing angel touched 

The parents' wound, and turned their desolation 

Into a present paradise, revealing 

Two dear ones, beckoning from the spirit-land. 

And one, detaining them, with infant grasp. 

Feeble, yet how resistless ! here below. 

And so there was great comfort in that house- 
hold: 
And those unwhispered longings both had felt 
At times, that they might pass to other scenes 
Where Love would find its own, were felt no 

more : 
For Linda grew in beauty every day ; 
Beauty not only of the outward mould. 
Sparkling in those dear eyes, and on the wind 
Tossing those locks of gold, but beauty born. 
In revelations flitting o'er the face. 
From the soul's inner symmetry ; from love 



The Father's Story, ii 

Too deep and pure to utter, had she words ; 
From the divine desire to know ; to prove 
All objects brought within her dawning ken ; 
From frolic mirth, not heedless but most apt ; 
From sense of conscience, shown in little things 
So early ; and from infant courtesy 
Charming and debonair. 

The parents said, 
While the glad tears shone brimming in their 

eyes, 
" Oh ! lacking love and best experience 
Are those who tell us that the purity 
And innocence of childhood are delusion ; 
Or that, so far as they exist, they show 
The absence of all mind ; no impulses 
Save those of selfish passion moving it ! 
And that, by nature desperately wicked,^ 
The child learns good through evil ; having no 
Innate ideas, no inborn will, no bias. 
Here, in this infant, is our confutation ! 



12 The Woman who Dared, 

O self-sufficing physiologist, 

Who, grubbing in the earth, hast missed the stars, 

We ask no other answer to thy creed 

Than this, the answer heaven and earth supply 

Now sixteen summers had our Linda seen. 
And grown to be a fair-haired, winsome maid, 
In shape and aspect promising to be 
A softened repetition of her mother ; 
And yet some traits from the paternal side 
Gave to the head an intellectual grace 
And to the liquid eyes a power reserved. 
Brooding awhile in tender gloom, and then 
Flashing emotion, as some lofty thought, 
Some sight of pity, or some generous deed. 
Kindled a ready sympathy whose tears 
Fell on no barren purpose ; for with Linda 
To feel, to be uplifted, was to act ; 
Her sorest trials being when she found 
How far the wish to do outran the power. 



The Fathers Story, 13 

Often would Percival observe his child, 

And study to divine if in the future 

Of that organization, when mature. 

There should prevail the elements that lead 

Woman to find the crowning charm of life 

In the affections of a happy marriage, 

Or if with satisfactions of the mind 

And the aesthetic faculty, the aims 

Of art and letters, the pursuits of trade, 

Linda might find the fresh activities 

He craved for her, and which forecasting care 

Might possibly provide. 

His means were small. 
Merged in a life-annuity which gave 
All that he held as indispensable 
To sanative conditions in a home : 
Good air, good influences, proper food. 
By making his old wardrobe do long service 
He saved the wherewith to get faithful help 
From the best teachers in instructing Linda ; 



14 The Woman who Dared. 

And she was still the object uppermost. 
Dawned the day fair, for Linda it was fair, 
And they all three could ramble in the Park. 
If on Broadway the ripe fruit tempted him, 
Linda was fond of fruit ; those grapes will do 
For Linda. Was the music rich and rare } 
Linda must hear it. Were the paintings grand .^ 
Linda must see them. So the important thought 
Was always Linda ; and the mother shared 
In all this fond parental providence ; 
For in her tender pride in the dear girl 
There was no room for any selfish thought, 
For any jealous balancing of dues. 

'' My child," said Percival, one summer day. 
As he brought in a bunch of snow-white roses, 
Ringed with carnations, many-leafed and fragrant, 
" Take it, an offering for your birthday ; this 
Is June the twelfth, a happy day for me." 
" How fresh, how beautiful ! " said Linda rising 



The Fathers Story. 15 

And kissing him on either cheek. " Dear 

father, 
You spoil me for all other care, I fear, 
Since none can be like yours." 

" Why speak of that } " 
He with a start exclaimed ; " my care must be 
Prolonged till I can see you safely fixed 
In an assured and happy womanhood. 
Why should it not be so } Though sixty-five, 
How well am 1, and strong ! No, Linda, no ; 
Dream not of other tendance yet awhile ; 
My father lived to eighty, and his father 
To eighty-five ; and I am stronger now 
Than they were, at my age." 

'' Live long ! " cried Linda, 
"For whom have I to love me, to befriend. 
You and my mother gone } " 

" Your mother, child .? 
She should outlive me by some twenty years 
At least. God grant, her sweet companionship 



1 6 The Woman who Dared. 

May be your strength and light when I 'm not 

here, 
My matchless little girl, my precious Linda ! " 

" Ah ! how Love magnifies the thing it loves ! " 
Smiling she said : " when I look in the glass, 
I see a comely Miss ; nay, perhaps pretty ; 
That epithet is her superlative, 
So far as person is concerned, I fear. 
Grant her a cheerful temper ; that she gets 
From both her parents. She is dutiful, — 
No wonder, for she never is opposed ! 
Strangely coincident her way is yours ; 
Industrious, but that 's her mother's training. 
Then if you come to gifts of mind — ah me ! 
What can she show ? We '11 not pronounce her 

dull; 
But she 's not apt or quick ; and all she gets 
Is by hard work, by oft-repeated trials. 
Trials with intermissions of despair. 



The Fathers Story. 17 

The languages she takes to not unkindly ; 

But mathematics is her scourge, her kill-joy, 

Pressing her like a nightmare. Logic, too, 

Distresses and confuses her poor brain ; 

Oh ! ask her not for reasons. As for music — 

Music she loves. Would that Love might inspire 

The genius it reveres so ardently ! 

Has she no gift for painting } Eye for form 

And coloring I truly think she has ; 

And one thing she can do, and do it well ; 

She can group flowers and ferns and autumn 

leaves, 
Paint their true tints, and render back to nature 
A not unfaithful copy. 

" This the extent 
Of her achievements ! She has labored hard 
To mould a bust or statue ; but the clay 
Lacked the Pygmalion touch beneath her hands. 
She '11 never be a female Angelo. 
She must come down content to mother Earth, 



1 8 The Woman who Dared. 

And study out the alphabet which Summer 

Weaves on the sod in fields or bordering woods. 

Such is your paragon, my simple father ! 

But now, this ordinary little girl. 

So seeming frank, (whisper it low !) is yet 

So deep, so crafty, and so full of wiles. 

That she has quite persuaded both her parents — 

In most things sensible, clear-seeing people — 

That she is just a prodigy indeed ! 

Not one of goodness merely, but of wit, 

Capacity, and general cleverness ! " 

"There, that will do, spoilt darhng ! What a 

tongue ! " 
Percival said, admiring while he chided. 
" O the swift time ! Thou 'rt seventeen to-day ; 
And yet, except thy parents and thy teachers, 
Friends and companions thou hast hardly known. 
'T is fit that I should tell thee why our life 
Has been thus socially estranged and quiet. 



The Fathers Story. 19 

Sit down, and let me push the arm-chair up 
Where I can note the changes in thy face ; 
For 't is a traitor, that sweet face of thine. 
And has a sign for every fleeting thought. 

" But here 's our Httle mother ! Come, my dear. 

And take a seat by Linda ; thou didst help me 

To graft upon the bitter past a fruit 

All sweetness, and thy very presence now 

Can take the sting from a too sad remembrance." 

The mother placed her hand upon his brow 
And said : " The water-lily springs from mud ; 
So springs the future from the past." Then he : 
" My father's death made me, at twenty-one. 
Heir to a fortune which in those slow days 
Was thought sufficient : I had quitted Yale 
With some slight reputation as a scholar. 
And, in the first flush of ingenuous youth 
When brave imagination's rosy hue 



20 The Woman who Dared, 

Tinges all unknown objects, I was launched 
Into society in this great place ; — 
Sisterless, motherless, and having seen 
But little, in my student life, of women. 

" All matrons who had marriageable girls 
Looked on me as their proper prey, and spread 
Their nets to catch me ; and, poor, verdant youth, 
Soon I was caught, — caught in a snare indeed, 
Though by no mother's clever management. 
Young, beautiful, accomplished, she, my Fate, 
Met me with smiles, and doomed me while she 

smiled 
Nimble as light, fluent as molten lead 
To take the offered mould, — apt to affect 
Each preference of taste or sentiment 
That best might flatter, — affable and kind. 
Or seeming so, — and generous to a fault, — 
But that was when she had a part to play, — 
Affectionate — ah ! there too she was feigning — 



The Fathers Story, 21 

As I look calmly back, to me she seems 
The simple incarnation of a mind 
Possessed of all the secrets of the heart, 
And quick to substitute a counterfeit 
For the. heart's genuine coin, and make it pass ; 
But void of feeling as the knife that wounds ! 
And so the game was in her hands, and she 
Played it with confident, remorseless skill 
Even to the bitter end. 

" Yet do not think 
The inner prescience never stirred or spoke : 
Veiled though it be from consciousness so 

strangely, 
And its fine voice unheard amid the din 
Of outward things, the quest of earthly passion, 
There is an under-sense, a faculty 
All independent of our mortal organs, 
And circumscribed by neither space nor time. 
Else whence proceed they, those clairvoyant 

glimpses. 



22 The Woman who Dared, 

That vision piercing to the distant future, 

Those quick monitions of impending ruin, 

If not from depths of soul which consciousness. 

Limited as it is in mortal scope, 

May not explore ? Yet there serenely latent, 

Or with a conscious being all their own, 

Superior and apart from what we know 

In this close keep we call our waking state, 

Lie growing with our growth the lofty powers 

We reck not of; which some may live a life 

And never heed, nor know they have a soul ; 

Which many a plodding anthropologist, 

Philosopher, logician, scientist. 

Ignore as moonshine ; but which are, no less, 

Actual, proven, and, in their dignity 

And grasp and space-defying attributes, 

Worthy to qualify a deathless spirit 

To have the range of an infinity 

Through an unending period — at once 

A promise and a proof of life immortal. 



The Fathers Story, 23 

*' One night, one mild, sweet night in early June, 
We two had paced the drawing-room together 
Till ten o'clock, and then I took my leave 
And walked along the street, a square or more, 
When suddenly I looked up at a star, 
And then, a thought I could not fail to heed. 
From the soul's awful region unexplored. 
Rushed, crying, 'Back! Go back!'* And back 

I went. 
As hastily as if it were a thing 
Of life or death. I did not stop to pull 
The door-bell, but sprang up alert and still 
To the piazza of the open window, 
Drew back a blind inaudibly, looked in. 
And through the waving muslin curtain, saw — 
Well, she was seated in a young man's lap, 
Her head upon his shoulder. 

" Quick of ear 
As the chased hare, she heard me ; started up. 
Ran to the curtain, eagerly drew me in. 



24 ^ The Woman who Dared. 

And said, while joy beamed tender in her eyes, 
' My brother Ambrose, just arrived from Europe ! ' 
So swift she was, she did not give me time 
Even for one jealous pang. I took his hand. 
And saying, ' Anna's brother must be mine,' 
I bade them both good-night, and went my way : 
So was I fooled, — my better angel baffled ! 

" And yet once more the vivid warning came, 
Flashed like quick truth from her own eyes. We 

stood 
Together in a ball-room, when a lady. 
To me unknown, came up, regarded me 
With strange compassion in her curious glance. 
And then, with something less divine than pity. 
Looked down on my betrothed, and moved away. 
1 turned to Anna, but upon her face. 
There was a look to startle like a ghost ; 
Defiance, deadly fear, and murderous hate 
Were all so wildly blended ! But 't was gone — 



The Fathers Story, 25 

Gone like a flash before I well could mark it ; 
And in its place there came a luminous smile, 
So childlike sweet, such type of heavenly candor. 
It would have served for a Madonna's mouth. 
To make the pilgrim's adoration easy. 

* Who was that lady, Anna ? ' I inquired. 

* A Mrs. Lothian,' was her reply : 

' A lovely person, although somewhat haughty.' 
We returned home soon after, and no more 
Was said of it. 

" The rapid weeks flew by, 
And Anna plied her powers to charm, but still 
Not all the subtle glamour of her presence 
Could bind in sleep my pleading monitor. 
And so at last I said : ' We both are young: 
Let us, as earnest of a mutual wish 
To share a perfect love, or none at all. 
Absolve each other here, without condition. 
From this engagement ; and, if three years hence 
We both are of one heart, then shall we find 
2 



26 The Woman who Dared, 

The means to make it known ; of that be sure ! 
Are you in your own loyalty so fixed 
As to accept the challenge ? Would you prize 
The love of any man, who could not bear 
A test so simple ? ' 

** The first word I spoke 
Made all my meaning plain to her ; she shook, 
But more perhaps with anger than with grief; 
She turned her face away, and covered it 
With both her hands, and so remained until 
I had done speaking ; then she rose at once. 
Her face averted still, (she durst not show it !) 
And grasped my hand, and, in a husky tone 
Sheathing her wrath, exclaimed: 'To-morrow, 

come 
At twelve — at twelve ! ' and rushed out of the 

room. 

" Prompt at the hour I went ; and in the parlor 
Sat down expectant ; and she entered soon. 



The Fathers Story, 27 

Clad all in white ; upon her face the marks 

Of passionate tears, and a beseeching sorrow 

In every look ! A desk of ivory, 

Borne in her hands, she placed upon the table ; 

I rose to meet her, but she motioned me 

To keep my seat ; then, with an arm thrown over 

A high-backed chair, as if to keep from falling, 

(The attitude was charming, and she knew it). 

She said : ' Take back the little desk you gave me ; 

In it are all your letters, — all your gifts. 

Take them, and give me mine.' 

" The last few words 
Came as if struggHng through a crowd of sobs. 
What could I do but lead her to the sofa, 
Sit by her side, take her white hand, and say : 

* This is no final separation, Anna ; 
It is a trial merely of our loves } ' 

" * A light affair perhaps to you,' she said, 

* But death to me. As whim or pleasure points, 



28 The Woman who Dared, 

You can go here, go there, and lead the Hfe 
You most affect ; while I, the home-kept slave 
Of others' humors, must brave poverty, 
Neglect and cruel treatment.' — ' Did you say 
Poverty, Anna ? ' — * Do not breathe a word 
Of what I tell you : father is a bankrupt. 
Or soon will be ; and we shall be compelled 
To quit our freestone house, and breathe the air 
Of squalid want. From that I 'd not recoil, 
Could I have loving looks and words ; for what 
Is poverty if there 's but love to gild it ? 
Ah ! poverty ' — ' Nay, Anna, poverty 
You shall not know, only accept from me 
The means to fix you in becoming plenty.' 
' Never ! ' she cried ; * ah ! cruel to propose it ! ' 
And then more tears ; till, touched and foiled, I 

said, 
Looking her in the face while she gazed up 
In mine with eager tenderness, — ' Accept 
A happy home, if I can help to make it. 
We will be married, Anna, when you please.' 



The Fathers Story, 29 

" And so she had her way, and we were married ; 
And the next day all Wall Street was aroused 
By news that brave Papa had won renown 
Not simply as a bankrupt, but a swindler, 
Escaping, by the skin of his teeth, the Tombs. 
' No matter ! Papa has a son-in-law, 
A greenhorn, as they say, who occupies 
A stately house on the Fifth Avenue, 
And, in his hall, Papa will hang his hat.' 
And, in all this. Rumor but hit the truth. 

" Six months rolled by. Repeatedly I asked, ' 
* Where 's Brother Ambrose ? ' He, it seems, was 

held 
In such request by government, that rarely 
Could he be spared for home enjoyment ; but 
At length I did encounter Brother Ambrose, 
And once again I found him — 

" Well, the scales 
Dropped from my eyes. I asked no other proof 



30 The Woman who Dared, 

Than a quick look I saw the two exchange, — 
Forgetful of a mirror at their side, — 
To see I was betrayed. He was no brother. 
I sought more proof ; but they, imagining 
I knew more than I did, were swift to act. 
Before I could find steps for a divorce 
She stole a march upon me, and herself 
Took the initiative, and played the victim, 
Nipping me as a culprit in the law. 

" It was a plot so dexterously framed. 

All the precautions and contrivances 

Were with such craft foreplanned ; the perjuries 

Were all so well adjusted ; my pure life 

Was made to seem so black ; the witnesses 

Were so well drilled, so perfect in their parts, — 

In short, it was a work of art so thorough, 

I did not marvel at the Court's decision, 

Which was, for her, — divorce and alimony ; 

For me, — no freedom, since no privilege 

Of marrying again. Such the decree ! " 



The Fathers Story, 31 

" I 'm glad you spurned it as you did ! " cried 

Linda, 
While her cheeks flushed, and hot, indignant tears, 
Responded to her anger. Then she kissed 
Her father on each cheek, and tenderly 
Embraced her mother too ; and they, the while, 
With a slight moisture in their smiling eyes, 
Exchanged a nod. Then Percival to Linda : 
" Why, what an utter rebel you would be, 
You little champion of the higher law ! 
Sit down, and hear me out." 

" If such their justice," 
Cried Linda, irrepressible and panting, 
" Who would not spurn it, and hurl back defiance 
To all the Justice Shallows on the Bench — 
To them and their decrees ! " 

" My little girl," 
The father said, " the heart's impulsive choice 
May guide us safely when the act must be 
Born of the instant, but let Reason rule 



32 The Woman who Dared. 

When Reason may. For some twelve years, I 

lived 
A wandering life in Europe ; not so crushed 
By my most harsh experience but I 
Could find, in study and in change of scene. 
How much of relish life has for the mind 
As well as the affections ; still I felt 
Mine was a nature in which these must play 
No secondary part ; and so the void 
Enlarged as age drew nearer ; and at forty 
A weariness of life came over me. 
And I was sick at heart ; for many a joy 
Had lost the charm that made it joy, I took 
A house in London, all for solitude, 
And there got what you may not find in Egypt, 
Or on Mont Blanc. 

" One day as I was crossing 
An obscure street, I saw a crowd of workmen 
Gathered around a man upon the ground : 
A rafter from a half-built house had fallen, 



The Fathers Story. | 33 

And he was badly injured. Seeing none 
To act with promptness in the case, I hailed 
A cab, and had him driven to my house. 
Finding he was a fellow-countryman, 
I gave him one of my spare rooms, and sent 
For the best surgeon near. His report was, 
The wound itself was nothing serious, 
But there was over-action of the brain. 
Quite independent, which might lead to danger, 
Unless reduced in season ; and the patient 
Should have the best of watching and attendance, 
And not be left to brood on any trouble. 
But be kept cheerful. Then with some directions 
For diet, sedatives, and laxatives. 
The doctor bowed, received his fee, and left. 
My guest lay sad and silent for a while. 
Then turned to me and said : ' My name is Ken- 
rick ; 
I 'm from Chicago — was a broker there. 
A month ago my wife eloped from me ; 

2* c 



34 The Woman who Dared, 

And her companion, as you may surmise, 

Was one I had befriended — raised from nothing. 

I 'm here upon their track." 

" ' Why so .? ' I asked. 
' What do you want of them V — ' What do I 

want 1 ' 
He stretched his eyes at me inquiringly. 
* How strange,' said I, ' the inconsistency ! 
Here 's a true man would try to overtake 
An untrue mate ! If she 's not sterling gold 
And loyal as the loadstone, — not alone 
In every act, but every thought and throb, — 
Why should you care who puts her to the proof. 
Takes her away, and leaves you free again ? 
Show me 't is an illusion I adore, 
And I will thank you, though it be in anguish. 
To no false gods I bow, if I can help it ! ' 

" ' Could I,' said Kenrick, 'have him only once 
Where I could take him by the throat, and meas- 
ure 



The Fathers Story, 35 

My strength with his!' — 'Tut, tut! the kind 

physician 
Who warns you of some lurking taint, to which 
The cautery should be applied at once. 
Is not, in act, if not intent, your friend 
More certainly than he you rave against. 
And you 've been jealous, I suppose, at times, 
Of the poor runaway ? ' — ' Ay, that I have I 
Bitterly jealous/ 

" * Jealousy and love 
Were never yet true mates ; for jealousy 
Is born of selfish passion, lust, or pride. 
While love is so divine and pure a thing, 
It only takes what cannot be withheld. 
It flies constraint. All that it gives is given, 
Even as the lily renders up its perfume, 
Because it cannot help it. Would it crave 
Return less worthy t Would it be content 
With a grudged gift t Then it is something else, 
Not love — not love ! Ah me ! how men and 

women 



36 The Woman who Dared, 

Cozen themselves with words, and let their pas- 
sions 
Fool them and blind, until they madly hug 
Illusions which some stunning shock like yours 
Puts to the proof, reveahng emptiness. 
Have you a loving heart, and would you feed it 
On what the swine have left, — mock it with 

Hes ? ' ' 
' Speak this to me again, when I am stronger,' 
Said Kenrick, smiling faintly. Then I left him, 
And taking up 'The Times' looked thro' the list 
Of ' Wants ' ; and one amid the many hundred 
Instantly caught my eye. It merely said : 
* Wanted, by a young woman, strong and healthy, 
A place as nurse for any invalid. 
Address 68 1, Times Office.' So 
I wrote and told 68 1 to call 
Upon me at a certain hour. 

" And now, 
My dear, this little girl with eager eyes 



The Fathers Story, ij 

Has, for a summer morning, heard enough. 

The weather is the crown of all that June 

Has of most fair, — the year's transcendent day ; 

When the young foliage and the perfect air 

Intoxicate the birds, and put our hearts 

In harmony with their extravagance 

Of joy and love. Come, come ! To slight this 

day 
Would be a sin. We '11 ramble in the Park, 
And take our dinner there, and see the flowers. 
The children, and the swans, and all the places 
Which Linda used to love in babyhood. 
When, in her Httle carriage, like a queen 
She 'd sit, receiving homage from all eyes." 

The father had his way ; and in the Park 
They spent the happy time, and felt the charm 
Which harmony complete with Nature brings 
When loving spirits, unpreoccupied. 
Gain by surrender, and grow rich by giving. 



38 The Woman who Dared, 

O sunshine and blue sky and genial airs ! 
To human happiness, like daily bread, 
Your blessings come, till the unthinking heart 
Recks not the debt we owe your silent powers. 
If ye can give so much, what may not He 
Of whose omnipotence ye are but shadows 
Have in reserve in his eternities ! 



III. 

THE MOTHER'S STORY. 

nPHAT evening, when the feast of strawberries 

Had been partaken, and the happy three 
tilt down together, Linda asked : "And now, 
May I not hear the rest ? " — "To-morrow, Linda, 
You shall hear all," said Percival ; "but now. 
That brain of yours must tranquillize itself 
Before you try to sleep ; and so, to-night. 
Let us have 'Annie Laurie,' 'Bonnie Doon,' 
And songs that most affront the dainty ear 
Of modern fashion." Linda played and sang 



40 The Woman who Dared. 

A full half-hour ; then, turning on her chair, 
Said, " Now shall mother sing that cradle ditty 
You made for me, an infant. Mother, mine. 
Imagine you are rocking me to sleep, 
As in those far-off days." 

Replied the mother : 
" O the dear days ! yet not more dear than 

these ! 
For frugal Linda brings along with her 
All of her past ; the infant's purity, 
The child's confiding love, and now, at last, 
The maiden's free and quick intelligence ! 
Be ever thus, my Linda ; for the pure 
In heart shall carry an immortal youth 
Into the great to-come. That little song — 
Well I remember the delightful time 
When 't was extemporized ; when, with my pen, 
I noted down the words, while, by your crib. 
Your father sat, and you, with little fists 
Drawn tight, would spring and start, as infants 

will, 



The Mothers Story, 41 

Crowing the while, and chuckHng at the words 

Not comprehended yet, save in the smiles 

That with them went ! 'T was at the mellow 

close 
Of an autumnal day, and we were staying 
In a secluded village, where a brook 
Babbled beneath our window, and the hum 
Of insects soothed us, while a louder note 
From the hoarse frog's bassoon would, now and 

then. 
Break on the cricket's sleepy monotone 
And startle laughter." Here the matron paused ; 
Then sweeping, with a firm, elastic touch, 
The ivory keys, sang 

LINDA'S LULLABY. 



Murmur low, little rivulet flowing ! 
For to sleep our dear Linda is going ; 
All good little lambs be reposing, 
For Linda one eyelid is closing. 



\\ \ 



42 The Woman who Dared, 

II. 

O frogs ! what a noise you are making ! 
O crickets ! now don't keep her waking ! 
Stop barking, you little dog Rover, 
Till Linda can get half-seas over. 

III. 
Little birds, let our word of love reach you, — 
Go to bed, go to sleep, I beseech you ; 
On her little white coverlet lying. 
To sleep our dear Linda is trying. 

IV. 

Hush ! sing just as softly as may be ; 
Sing lullaby, lullaby, baby ! 
Now to sleep this dear Linda is going, — 
Murmur low, little rivulet flowing ! 

The next day, when the heat kept all at home, 
And they were gathered in the library, 
Where fitfully a lazy southern breeze 
Would stir the languid curtains, Percival 
Said, turning to the mother : " Mary, now 
Your story best will supplement my own ; 



The Mothers Story. 43 

Tell it." She answered : " Let it be so, then ; 

My life is but the affluent to yours, 

In which it found its amplitude and rest. 

My parents dwelt in Liverpool ; my father, 
A prosperous merchant, gave to business 
His time and active thoughts, and let his wife 
Rule all beside with rigor absolute. 
My maiden name was Mary Merivale. 
There were eight daughters of us, and of these 
I was the fourth. We lived in liberal style, 
And did not lack the best society 
The city could afford. My heedful mother, 
With eight undowered girls to be disposed of. 
Fearfully healthy all, and clamorous 
For clothes and rations, entered on a plan 
To which she steadily adhered : it was, 
To send the younger fry to boarding-schools, 
And keep one virgin only, at a time, 
And she the oldest, on her hands to marry. 



44 The Woman who Dared. 

So they came forward in their order : Julia, 
And Isabel, and Caroline ; until 
I was dragged forth from maps and lexicons, 
Slate-pencils and arithmetics, and put 
Candidate Number Four, upon the list. 

"My elder sisters had been all ' well-married' ; 
That is, to parties able to provide 
EstabUshments that Fashion would not scorn ; 
What more could be desired by loving parents ? 
As for resistance to her will, when once 
She set her heart upon a match, my mother 
Would no more bear it than a general 
Would bear demur from a subordinate 
When ordered into action. If a daughter, 
When her chance offered, and was checked as 

good. 
Presumed, from any scruple of dislike. 
To block the way for her successor, then 
Woe to that daughter, and no peace for her 



The Mothers Story. 45 

Did she not, with an utter selfishness, 
Stand in her younger sister's Ught ? imperil 
The poor child's welfare ? doom her possibly 
To an old maid's forlorn and cheerless lot ? 

" And so, with an imperious will, my mother 
Would sweep away all hindrances, all doubts. 
She was, besides, the slave of system ; having 
Adopted once the plan of bringing forward 
No daughter till the previous one was mated, 
It was a sacred custom ; 't was her own ! 
It had worked well ; must not be broken through. 
So my poor sisters went ; and some of them 
With doubting hearts. 

'' In me, my zealous mother 
Found metal not so malleable quite. 
One of my teachers at the boarding-school, 
A little woman who got scanty pay 
For teaching us in P>ench and German, fed 
Her lonely heart with dreams of what, some day, 



46 The Woman who Dared, 

Shall lift her sex to nobler life. She took 

A journal called 'The Good Time Coming/ 

filled 
With pleadings for reform of many kinds, — 
In education, physical and mental. 
Marriage, the rights of women, modes of living. 
Weekly I had the reading of it all ; 
Some of it crude enough, some apt and just, 
Forcibly put, and charged with vital facts. 
At last these had for me a fascination 
That quite ecHpsed the novels of the day. 

" I learnt, that, bound up in the moral law. 
Are laws of health and physical control, 
Unhejeded in the family and school ; 
How fashion, stupid pride, and love of show. 
The greed of gain, or the pursuit of pleasure. 
Empty and frivolous, make men and women 
False to their natures, cruel to each other 
And to the unborn offspring they devote 



The Mothers Story, 47 

To misery through ill-assorted unions, 
Or habits reckless of maternal dues ; 
How marriage, sacredest of mortal steps. 
Is entered on from motives all unworthy ; 
Social ambition, mercenary aims. 
The dread of poverty, of singleness, — 
The object of uniting families, — 
And momentary passion fatuous. 
So I resolved, God helping, to be true 
To my own self, and that way true to all. 

" The fete that signalized my coming out 
Was, so my mother said, the costliest yet. 
Whole greenhouses were emptied to adorn 
Our rooms with flowers ; a band played in the 

hall; 
The supper-table flashed with plate and silver 
And Dresden ware and bright Bohemian glass ; 
The wines and viands were profuse and rare ; 
And everybody said, 't was a grand ball. 



48 The Woman who Dared. 

" But what of her, for whom it was the flourish 

Of trumpets blown to celebrate her entrance 

Into society ? Let others speak ! 

These the remarks I had to overhear : 

' She 's rather pretty.' — ' Pretty is the word/ 

' But not so dashing as the elder sisters.' 

' Cleverer though, perhaps,' — 'She takes it coolly. 

Her heart 's not in the ball ; that 's evident.' 

' Where is it } Is she bookish .? ' — 'So I 've 

heard.' 
'Unlike the rest, then.' — 'That straw-colored 

silk 
Should have had flounces.' — ' Is that hair her 

own } ' 
' I think so .? ' — ' She 's no dancer.' — ' Apathetic 
As any duchess.' — ' The young men seem shy ; 
She does n't put them at their ease, 't is plain.* 
' See, the old woman chides her ; she deserves it ; 
She '11 not pick up admirers if she plays 
My Lady Cool so grandly. Watch mamma. 



The Mothers Story, 49 

The hook is nicely baited ; where are all 

The gudgeons it should lure ? I marvel not 

Mamma is in a fluster ; tap, tap, tap, 

See her fan go ! No strategy, no effort, 

No dandy-killing shot from languid eyes. 

On that girl's part ! And all this fuss for her ! ' 

" The gossips, in these random whisperings, 
Made some good shots, that failed not of the 

mark. 
The lights, the roses, the voluptuous music, 
The shining robes, the jewels, the bright faces 
EngrossecT me not so much as one pale face, 
Youthful but pinched, which I had seen a mo- 
ment. 
An hour before, reflected in the mirror 
At which I stood while nimble dressing-maids 
Helped to array me. A poor girl had brought 
The bodice of my silken robe, on which 
She had been worki'^:g closely ; and my mother 



50 The Woman who Dared, 

Chided her for delay ; but no reply 

Was made, save only what the pleading eyes 

Could not withhold. Then tendering a scrap 

Of paper, record of her paltry charge. 

She meekly stood. ' Pooh ! bring it here next 

week,' 
My mother said. ' No ! ' turning round, I cried ; 
' Let her be paid at once ; there must be money 
In the house somewhere ; it may be a loss, 
An inconvenience, for her to come back 
Just for a trifling sum.' — * Impertinent ! ' 
My mother kindling, cried. ' Do you rule here ? ' 

* I can return,' timidly said the girl. 

Then a gold thimble from my drawer I took. 
And offered it, remarking, ' Keep or sell it. 
To hold you good for all your wasted time.' 

* My time, — what is it worth } ' replied the girl. 
Motioning her refusal, but with smiles 

Of speechless gratitude, and then escaping 
Before I could prevent her. ^. 



The Mothers Story, 51 

" ' Novel-reading 
Has brought you to this insipidity,' 
My mother said : ' such sentimental pap, 
You never got from me. Come, hurry down ; 
Put off that sullen look. The carriages 
Begin to roll ; the guests are on the stairs. 
Learn to command your smiles, my dear. Now 
go.' 

" So down I went, but in no conquering mood. 
I did not scrutinize the festive dresses ; 
Of the sad hearts I thought, the poor thin hands 
That put of life somewhat in every stitch 
For a grudged pittance. All disguises fell ; 
Voices betrayed the speakers in their tones, 
Despite of flattering words ; and smiles revealed 
The weariness or hatred they would hide. 
And so, preoccupied and grave, I looked 
On all the gayety ; and reigning belles 
Took heart to find in me no coming rival. 



52 The Woman who Dared, 

" Lent now was near ; the time of all diversion 
And visiting was over ; and my mother 
Summed up her griefs in this one lamentation : 
' The season gone, and not one offer yet ! 
You, Mary, are the first one of my daughters 
Whose coming-out so flat a failure proved. 
Think of your sister Julia ; her first winter 
Brought Hammersley to her feet. A splendid 

match ! 
First cousin to a lord ! How envious 
Were all the dowagers at my success ! 
If I 've not done all that a mother could, 
Tell me wherein I 've failed. Yet one year more 
I shall allow you for your trial. Then, 
If you have made no step in the direction 
Of matrimony, why, you must go off 
To Ireland, to America, or France, 
^.Ijftd leave the field for your next younger 
For Susan.' — ' She is welcome to it now,' 
I said, with something like disdain, I fear. 



The Mothers Story, 53 

In my cold smile. — ' My plans are laid, you know/ 
Replied my mother ; ' find your duty in . 
A simple acquiescence ; I know best' 

" 'T is said the woman always is to blame 
If a man ventures to commit himself 
In a proposal unacceptable. 
The rule has its exceptions ; for I gave 
No word, no inkling of encouragement 
To Captain Dudley ; yet I had an offer 
From Captain Dudley. Young, and elegant. 
Though of a stock somewhat attenuate ; 
Rich, though a younger son ; a gentleman, 
A scholar, — what good reason could I give 
For saying Nay to such an applicant t 

* Explain ! ' my mother cried, with brow severe ; 
' Is not his character without a flaw 1 ' 

* So far as known to me.' — ' Is he a fool } ' 

* Far from it ; culture and good sense are his.' 

* Could you not love him }' — ' Very tenderly, 



54 The Woman who Dared, 

Perhaps, with time to aid.' — ' Has any one 
Preoccupied your heart ? ' — ' My heart is free, 
And has been always free.' — ' Indeed t Then 

why 
Refuse to be the wife of this young man ? ' 

* Simply because he 's not the man I 'd choose 
To be the father of a child of mine.' 

" If I had put a pistol at her head, 
My lady mother would not so have started. 
' What ! a mere girl — and you can entertain 
Such thoughts ! so selfish, gross, unmaidenly ! ' 

* If,' I replied, ' I 'm old enough to dream 
Of marriage, as you bid me, then 't is time 
For me to think of all the risk I run. 
Selfish, you call it ; gross, unmaidenly ; 

Is it unmaidenly to hesitate 
In the surrender of my maiden state t 
Your epithets belong to those who fail 
To think at all, or only think of this : 



The Mothers Story. 55 

What 's the man's income ? Will he let me have 
A house in the right quarter ? Keep a carriage ? 
And is he in society ? Such women 
Plant nightshade, and affect to wonder why 
The growth is not of lilies and carnations ! ' 

" * So ! just let loose from school,' replied my 

mother, 
' You 'd teach me what is womanly ! Pert minx ! 
Tell me in simple English what you mean 
By your objections to this match, so largely 
Above your merits ? ' — ' This is what I mean : 
For reasons that are instincts more than reasons, 
And therefore not to be explained to those 
Who in them do not share, as you do not, 
I would not wed this man, — not if I loved him.' 
* Enough ! You 've had your turn ; and now pre- 
pare 
To make a visit to your father's cousin 
In Nova Scotia ; there, perhaps, you may 



5 6 The Woman who Dared, 

Find a congenial mate among the clowns 

And roughs provincial. Go and pack your trunk. 

Fool your own opportunities away ; 

You shall not thrust your sister out of hers.' 

" I did not pack my trunk ; another suitor. 
One twice as rich as Dudley, kindled hopes 
Anew in my poor mother's breast ; and so 
Susan was kept at school another season, 
And I was put upon the course once more, 
My training perfect and my harness new ! 

" Who could object to Arthur Pennington ? 
Son of a wealthy manufacturer, 
A type he was of English adolescence. 
Trained by harmonious culture to the fulness 
Of all that Nature had supplied ; a person 
That did not lack one manly grace ; a mind 
Which took the mould that social pressure gave. 
Without one protest native to itself. 



The Mothers Story, 57 

In the accepted, the conventional, 

He looked for Truth, nor ever had a doubt 

Whether she might not hide in some deep well 

Rather than flaunt her modest purity 

In dusty highways. With my disposition 

To challenge all that human dogmatism 

Imperious would impose upon my thought, 

What pretty yoke -fellows for life should we, 

Arthur and I, have been ! Misled by hopes 

Which were inspired too fondly by my mother, 

He, too, proposed, and was of course rejected. 

" Then the storm broke ! The cup of my offences 
Was overflowed at last. Now must I go — 
Go, where she cared not ; only disappear 
From her domain ; she washed her hands of me ! 
Hundreds of pounds had been invested in me, — 
My dresses, jewelry, and entertainments, — 
And here was the result ! But no more money, 
From her, must I expect ; my father's income 
3* 



58 The Woman who Dared. 

Had not for years been equal to his outlays. 
Any day he might be compelled to change 
His style of living ; all had been kept up 
For the advantage of myself and sisters ; 
And here was all the gratitude I showed ! 

"This time my mother was in earnest ; so 
Now must I lay my plans to go at once. 
Whither ? to seek a transient home with one 
Of my own married sisters ? Ah ! the thought 
Of being dependent galled me like a spur. 
No ! go to work, — a voice within me said : 
Think of the many thousands of your sex 
Who, young and giddy, not equipped like you, 
Are thrown upon the world to battle with it 
As best they may ! Now try your closet virtue ; 
See if your theory can stand the proof, — 
If trial will not warp your sense of right. 
When Poverty shall dog your every step, 
And at your scanty or unwholesome meal 



The Mothers Story. 59 

Sit down, or with you, in your thin attire. 
Go shivering home at night from ill-paid toil, — 
Then see if you can keep your feet from straying ; 
Then choose as only Conscience bids you choose ! 

" The sewing-girl who worked upon my dress, 
The day of the great ball, was Lucy Merle ; 
I found her saving up her petty means 
To go to London, to get better wages, — 
And said : * Well, Lucy, let us go together.' 
She sold some jewels for me, and we went. 

" In London ! two unfriended girls in London ! 
We hired a room, and got employment soon. 
Such as it was ; but small the recompense ! 
Though Lucy, quicker at her work than I, 
Could earn enough to live upon — almost. 
For her the change was slight. 

" A year we toiled 
In company ; and I '11 not tell you all 



6o The Woman who Dared, 

The hardships, trials, wrongs, we underwent. 

In my blue trunk you '11 find a little pistol, 

Got for our joint protection in those days. 

May it be near you, should you ever need it ! 

Finding, at length, I could no longer earn 

My share of our expenses by the needle, 

I sought a situation as a nurse. 

And in 'The Times' I advertised my 'Want' 

An answer came, directing me to call 

Upon the writer at a certain hour. 

I went. I met a man of middle age 

Whose name was Percival. I thought his manner 

Was coldly kind. 

" ' You 're very young,' he said, 

* To fill the situation of a nurse. 

What reference have you ? ' Not a distant 

thought 
Of such a need had ever troubled me ! 

* I bring,' said I, ' no reference.' — ' That 's a pity. 
What pledge have I of character ? ' — ' Not any.' 



The Mothers Story, 61 

And then, impatient at this let, I cried : 
' Look in my face, and if you find not there 
Pledge of my truth, Heaven help me, for 't is all — 
All I can give ! ' — * Ah ! my poor child,' said he, 
' Such warrant have I learnt to take with doubt ; 
For I have known a face, too beautiful. 
With look of innocence and shining candor, 
Prove but the ambush of dupUcity, 
Pitiless and impure. But let me not 
Distrust too far.' Then he turned up the gas, 
And, with a scrutiny intent and grave. 
Perused my face. " What is your name .? ' he 

asked. 
After a silence. — ' Mary Merivale.' 
' Well, Mary, I engage you ; come at once. 
In the next room asleep reclines our patient. 
As for your wages, we will say two guineas 
A week, if you 're content.' — ' O, perfectly ! ' 

" So, groping in my darkness, I at length 



62 The Woman who Dared. 

Hit on the door that issued into light. 

Long talks between the patient and his friend 

Were frequent, and they heeded not my presence. 

Little by little Percival soon told 

The story that you Ve heard, and more which you 

May never hear in earthly interviews. 

An eager listener, I would treasure up 

Each word, each look ; and on my soul at last 

Dawned the pure ray by which I saw those traits, 

The spirit's own, that harmonized so well 

With all the outward showed of good and noble. 

Strange that he took no notice of the way 

My very life was drifting ! But to him 

I seemed a child, and his paternal airs 

Froze me and checked. 

" A paragraph, ' The Times ' 
Had published, when the accident took place, 
Mentioned that Kenrick was a millionnaire, 
Though quite a young man still. 

" A month went by 



The Mothers Story. 63 

And he was able to sit up awhile ; 

And soon, with me beside him in the carriage, 

To take a drive ; — when one day, Percival 

Said to me : ' Mary, you and I must try 

The span to-day ; our patient shall keep house/ 

My heart beat wildly ; Kenrick looked as if 

Approving the arrangement ; so we went. 

' I wished,' said Percival, ' to talk with you 

In private ; do not answer if I put 

Questions that may embarrass or annoy ; 

It is no idle curiosity. 

Prompting me now. We see that you were born 

To something better than this drudgery : 

If not reluctant, tell me who you are.' 

* O, willingly ! ' I said. 

" And so I told him 
All, from the first. He heard me patiently ; 
And then remarked : ' But do you never long 
For that secure and easy life at home } 
You will go back to Liverpool, perchance. 



64 The Woman who Dared, 

When you 've had quite enough of servitude 

And toil precarious.' — ' I go not back/ 

Said I, * while health and liberty are left. 

The home that 's grudged is not the home for me. 

Give me but love, and like the reed I yield ; 

Deal with me harshly, you may break, not bend 

me.' 
* Ah ! there is something wrong in all these 

things,' 
Replied he, musing. 

*' ' Yes,' I said ; ^ consider 
What I 've been telling of my mother's way 
Of marrying her daughters ; well, my mother 
Is but the product of that social system. 
Hollow and false, which leaves for dowerless girls 
Few honorable outlooks for support 
Excepting marriage. Poor, dependent, helpless. 
Untaught in any craft that could be made 
To yield emolument, — our average women, — 
What can they do but take the common path 



The Mothers Story. 65 

Which my poor mother would have made me try, 

And lead some honest man to think that they 

Are wedding him, and not his bank-account ? 

ft 
Let woman, equally with man, be bred 

To learn with thoroughness some craft or trade 

By which she may support herself at least, 

You place her more at hberty to shun 

Unions, no priest, no church can sanctify ! ' 

" Percival eyed me with a puzzled look, 
Then said : ^ The time is on its way, I hope. 
When from her thraldom woman will come forth. 
And in her own hands take her own redress ; 
When laws disabling her shall not be made 
Under the cowardly, untested plea 
That man is better qualified than woman 
To estimate her needs and do her justice. 
Justice to her shall be to man advancement ; 
And woman's wit can best heal woman's wrongs. 
Accelerate that time, all women true 



66 The Woman who Dared. 

To their own sex, — yet not so much to that 
As to themselves and all the human race ! 
But pardon me ; I wander from the point, — 
Following you. Now tell me, could you make 
America your home ? ' 

" The sudden question 
Made my heart leap, and the hot crimson rush 
Up to my brow. Silent I bowed my head, 
And he continued thus : * If it should be, 
That one, not wholly aUen to your tastes, — 
A man not quite so young as you, perhaps, 
But not beyond his prime, — an honest man, — 
I will not say with ample means, for that 
Would jar upon your heart, — one who could 

make 
Your home a plentiful and happy one, — 
Should offer you his hand, — would it deter you 
To know that in America your lot 
Must henceforth be t ' 

" My breath came quick, — my eyes 



The Mother's Story, 6j 

Turned swift away, lest he should mark their joy 
And count his prize too cheaply won. I sighed, 
But did not speak. ' May I go on t ' he asked. 
A ' yes ' distinct, though faint, flew from my lips. 
^ May I,' said he, ' tell Kenrick he may hope ? * 
' What ! ' cried I, looking up, with something 

fiercer 
Than mere chagrin in my unguarded frown." 

Linda broke in upon the story here, 
And turning to her father with a smile 
Tender as dawning light, yet arch and gay. 
Cried, " Fie, my father ! Could you be so dull I 
How could you treat my future mother so .'' " 
" Nay, do not blame me hastily," said he. 
With glad paternal eyes regarding her ; 
" How could a modest man — and I was one — 
Suppose that youth and wealth, and gracious 

gifts 
Of person, such as Kenrick wore so well. 



68 The Woman who Dared, 

Could fail to win ? Truly I did not dream, 
Spite of the proverb, Love could be so blind." 

Tossing her head with mock vindictive air. 
Like sweet sixteen, the mother then resumed : 
" Kenrick, it seems, being a bashful man, — 
And somewhat shy, perhaps, because I knew 
He was but recently in mad pursuit 
Of an unfaithful spouse, a runaway. 
Commissioned Percival to try the ground, 
Obscure and doubtful, of my woman's will. 
My absolute ' What ! ' was unequivocal. 
Then turning to the coachman, Percival, 
Said, ' Home, now, home ! and quickly ! ' 

" Home we rattled, 
And both were silent to our journey's end. 
An eager glance he gave me as he touched 
My hand to help me from the carriage. He 
Has told me since that I returned the look 
With one which, if not actually scorn. 



The Mothef's Story, 69 

Was next of kin to scorn, and much resem- 
bling : — 
All the chimera of his guilty conscience. 

" Kenrick next day renewed his suit by letter ; 
He begged I would not give a hasty ' No/ 
But wait and grant him opportunities 
To prove that he was worthy and sincere, 
And to procure the requisite divorce. 
While I was answering his letter, he 
Drove out with Percival. My brief reply 
Told him there could be no decision other 
Than a complete and final negative. 

" Then I sat down and ran my fingers over 
The keys of the piano ; and my mood 
At length expressed itself in that wild burst 
Of a melodious anguish, which Edgardo 
Gives vent to in ' Lucia.' Words could add 
Nothing to magnify the utter heart-break 



70 The Woman who Dared, 

Of that despair ; and Donizetti's score 
Has made the cry audible through the ages. 
Less from the instrument than from my heart 
Was wrung the passionate music. 

" At its close, 
A long-drawn breath made me look round, and 

there 
Whom should I see but Percival, as if 
Transfixed in mute surprise ! * I did not know 
There was a listener, — had supposed you gone,' 
Said I ; and he replied : ' I thought you 'd have 
Some word for Kenrick : so our drive was short.* 
* Nothing but this.' I handed him my letter ; 
He took it, bowed, and left me. 

" The next day 
I learnt that Kenrick had engaged his passage 
In Wednesday's steamer for New York. My 

stay 
Must now be brief ; my services no longer 
Could be of any use ; and so I wrote 



The Mothers Story, 71 

Some formal lines, addressed to Percival, 
Asking for my dismissal, and conveying 
To both the gentlemen my thanks sincere 
For all their kindness and munificence. 
Two days I waited, but no answer came. 

" The third day Kenrick sought an interview. 
We met, and freely talked of this and that. 
Said he, at last : ' Into what false, false ways 
We plunge because we do not care to think ! 
We shudder at Chinese morality 
When it allows a parent to destroy 
Superfluous female children. Look at home! 
Have we no ancient social superstitions 
Born of the same old barbarous family } 
My life. Miss Merivale, has been so crowded 
That I Ve had little time to trace opinion 
Down to its root before accepting it. 
In giving opportunity for thought, 
Sickness has been a brisk iconoclast. 



72 The Woman who Dared, 

Behold the world's ideal of a wife ! 
T is something like to this : 

" *■ She marries young, 
Perhaps in meek submission to the will 
Parental, or in hope of a support ; 
In a few years, — as heart and brain mature, 
And knowledge widens, — finds her lord and 

master 
Is a wrong-headed churl, a selfish tyrant, 
A miser, or a blockhead, or a brute ; 
Her love for him, if love there ever was. 
Is turned to hatred or indifference : 
What shall she do ? The world has one reply : 
You made your bed, and you must lie in it ; 
True, you were heedless seventeen — no matter ! 
True, a false sense of duty urged you on, 
And you were wrongly influenced — no matter ! 
Be his wife still ; stand by him to the last ; 
Do not rebel against his cruelty ; 
The more he plays the ruffian, the more merit 



The Mother's Story. 73 

In your endurance ! Suffering is your lot ; 

It is the badge and jewel of a woman. 

Shun not contamination from his touch ; 

Keep having children by him, that his traits 

And his bad blood may be continuous. 

Think that you love him still ; and feed your 

heart 
With all the lies you can, to keep it passive ! 

" ' So say the bellwethers who lead the many 
Over stone walls into the thorns and ditches, 
Because their fathers took that way before them. 
Such is the popular morality ! 
But is it moral t Nay ; when man or woman 
Can look up, with the heart of prayer, and say, 
Forbid it. Heaven, forbid it, self-respect, 
Forbid it, merciful regard for others, 
That this one should be parent to my child, — 
That moment should the intimate relations 
Of marriage end, and a release be found ! 
4 



74 The Woman who Dared, 

" ' How many blunder in mistaking Passion, 
Mixed with a little sentiment, for Love ! 
Passion may lead to Love, as it may lead 
Away from Love, but Passion is not Love ; 
It may exist with Hate ; too often leads 
Its victim blindfold into hateful bonds, 
Under the wild delusion that Love leads. 
Love's bonds are adamant, and Love a slave ; 
And yet Love's service must be perfect freedom. 
Candor it craves, for Love is innocent, — 
But no enforced fidelity, no ties 
Such as the harem shelters. Dupes are they 
Who think that Love can ever be compelled ! 
Only what 's lovely Love can truly love. 
And fickleness and falsehood are deformed. 
Reveal their features. Love may mourn indeed. 
But will not rave. Love, even when abandoned. 
Feels pity and not anger for the heart 
That could not prize Love's warm fidelity. 
But Passion, selfish, proud, and murderous. 



The Mothers Story. 7S 

Seizes the pistol or the knife, and kills ; — 
And cozened juries make a heroine 
Of her who, stung with jealousy or pride, 
Or, by some meaner motive, hurled a wreck, 
Assassinates her too inconstant wooer. 

" * Now do I see how Httle, in my case. 

There was of actual love, how much of passion ! 

Love's day for me, if it may ever come 

In this brief stage, is yet to dawn. You smile ; 

Love must have hope, a ray of hope, at least, 

To catch the hue of Hfe ; and so, Miss Mary, 

I '11 not profess to love you ; all I say 

Is, that a Uttle hope from you would make me ! 

But, since we can't be lovers, let 's be friends ; 

Here, in this little wallet, is a check 

For an amount that will secure your future 

From serious want, — a sum I shall not miss. 

But which — ' 

" With many thanks I answered ' No ! ' 



76 The Woman who Dared, 

' What can I do ? ' he asked, ' to show my debt 
To you and Percival ? ' I shook my head, 
And something in the sadness of my smile 
Arrested his attention. But that moment 
A girl rushed in with cry of ' O, he 's killed — 
Killed, the poor man ! ' — ' Who ? ' — ' Mr. Per- 
cival ! ' 
The name was like a blow upon my heart. 
And Kenrick saw it, and supported me. 

" But in a moment I was strong. I heard 

A scuffling noise of people at the door, 

And then a form — 't was Percival' s — was borne 

Into a room, and placed upon a bed. 

Pale and insensible he lay ; a surgeon 

Came in ; at last we got an explanation : 

In rescuing from a frightened horse the child 

Of a poor woman, Percival had been 

Thrown down, an arm been broken, and the pain 

Had made him faint. My nervous laugh of joy, 



The Mothers Story, 77 

When I was sure that this was the extreme 
Of injury, betrayed my reckless heart, 
And Kenrick had my secret. Percival 
Was soon himself; the broken limb was set, 
And I, engaged to stay another week 
To wait on the new patient — nothing loath. 

" The day of his departure, Kenrick drew me 
Aside, and, in a whisper, said, * He loves you ! ' 

* Loves me ? ' With palms held tightly on my 

breast 

To keep my heart down, I repeated, ' Loves 
me?' 

'T was hard to credit. ' Pardon me,' said Ken- 
rick, 

* If by communication of your secret, 
I changed the desolation of his life 

To sudden bloom and fragrance, for a moment.' 

* A moment only V — ' Soon his scruples rose : 
It cannot be ! he said ; two mountains lie 



\\\ 



78 The Woman who Dared, 

Between my fate and hers. — Two bubbles rather! 
Retorted I ; let 's take their altitude. — 
One is my age. — That mountain is already 
Tunnelled or levelled, since she sees it not. — 
The other is that infamous decree 
Against me at the period of my suit, 
Granting the guilty party a divorce, 
But me prohibiting to wed again. — 
Well, that decree (I answered bitterly) 
Would have with me the weight of a request 
That I 'd hereafter quaff at common puddles 
And not at one pure fount ; I 'd heed the bar 
As I would heed the grass-webbed gossamer ; 
I 'd sooner balk a bench of drivellers 
Than outrage sacred nature. — If that bench 
Could have you up for bigamy, what then ? — 
The dear old dames ! they should not have the 

means 
To prove it on me : for the pact should be 
'Twixt me and her who would accept my troth 



The Mothers Story. 79 

Freely before high heaven and all its angels : 

Witnesses which the sheriff could not summon, 

Could not, at least, produce. — But, Kenrick, you 

Do not consider all the risk and pain ; 

The social stigma, and, should children come, 

The grief, the shame, the disrepute to them. — 

To which I answered : God's great gift of life, 

Coming through parentage select and pure. 

To me is such a sacred, sacred thing. 

So precious, so inestimably precious, 

That your objections seem of small account ; 

Since only stunted hearts and slavish minds 

Could visit on your children disrepute. 

Who fitly could ignore such Brahmanism,^ * 

Since they 'd be born, most probably, with brains. 

" ' When the neglect of form, if 't is neglected. 
Is all in honor, purged of selfishness. 
Where shall the heart and reason lay the blame ? 
But understand me : Would I cheapen form ? 



So The Woman who Dared, 

Nay, I should fear that those who would evade it, 

Without a reason potent as your own, 

Trifled with danger. But I cannot make 

A god of form, an idol crushing me. 

Unlike the church, I look on marriage as 

A civil contract, not a sacrament. 

Indissoluble, spite of every wrong ; 

The high and holy purposes of marriage 

Are not fulfilled in instances where each 

Helps to demoralize or blight the other ; 

Let it then stand, like other contracts, on 

A basis purely personal and legal. 

" ' Oh ! how we hug the fictions we are born to ! 

Challenging never, never testing them ; 

Accepting them as irreversible ; 

Part of God's order, not to be improved ; 

Placing the form above the informing spirit. 

The outward show above the inward life ; 

A hollow he, well varnished, well played out. 



The Mothers Story, 8r 

Above the pure, the everlasting truth ; 
Fancying Nature is not Nature still, 
Because repressed, or cheated, or concealed ; 
Juggling ourselves with frauds a very child, 
Yet unperverted, readily would pierce ! 

" ' Consider my own case : a month ago, 

See me a maniac, rushing forth to find 

A wife who loved me not ; my heart all swollen 

With rage against the man to whom I owed 

Exposure of her falsehood ; ah, how blind ! 

To chase a form from which the soul had fled ! 

If I grew sane at length, you, Percival, 

And the mere presence of our little nurse 

Have brought me light and healing. I am cured. 

Thank Heaven, and can exult at my release. 

" ' Here I paused. Percival made no reply, 
But sat like one absorbed. I paced the floor 
Awhile, and then confronting him resumed : — 
4* F 



82 The Woman who Dared, 

Your scruples daunt you still ; well, there 's a way 

To free you from the meshes of the law : 

On my return, I '11 go to Albany, 

Where war's financial sinews, as you know. 

Are those of legislation equally ; 

I '11 have a law put through to meet your case ; 

To strip away these toils. I can ; I will ! — 

Percival almost stunned me with his No ! 

Make me a gutter, adding more pollution 

To the fount of public justice ? Never ! No ! 

I would not feed corruption with a bribe, 

To win release to-morrow. Such a cure 

Would be, my friend, far worse than the disease. — 

Then there 's no way, said I ; and so, farewell ! 

The carriage waits to take me to the station. — 

I shall not say farewell until we part 

Beside the carriage-door, said he : you '11 take 

Your leave of Mary } — Yes, I go to seek her. — 

And this, Miss Mary, is a full report 

Of all that passed between my friend and me.' 



The Mothers Story. 83 

" Here Kenrick ended. He had been, methought, 

Thus copious, in the hope his argument 

Would make me look as scornfully as he 

On obstacles that Percival would raise. 

I thanked him for his courtesy, and then, 

Not without some emotion, we two parted. 

When the last sound of the retiring wheels 

Was drowned in other noises, Percival 

Came in, and found me waiting in the parlor. 

* Now let me have a talk with you,' he said. 

So, in the little parlor we sat down. 

I see it now, all vividly before me ! 

The carpet — ay, its very hues and figures : 

The chandelier, the sofa, the engraving 

Of Wellington that hung above the mantel ; 

The Httle bookcase, holding Scott and Irving, 

And Gibbon's Rome, and Eloisa's Letters ; 

And, in a vase, upon the marble stand, 

An opening rose-bud I had plucked that day — 

Type of my own unfolding, rosy hope ! 



84 The Woman who Dared, 

" Said Percival : ' We '11 not amuse each other 

With words indifferent ; and we '11 allow 

Small opportunity for hearts to speak : 

We know what they would utter, might we dare 

To give them audience. Let Reason rule. 

What I propose is this : that we now part — 

Part for two years ; and when that term shall end, 

If we are still in heart disposed as now, 

Then can we orient ourselves anew, 

And shape our course as wary conscience bids. 

Till then, no meeting and no correspondence ! 

"'Now for conditions more particular: 

You have a sister — Mrs. Hammersley — 

Julia, I think you said, — an elder sister, 

Resident here, and in society, 

But fretted by her lord's extravagance 

And her own impecuniosity. 

You at her house shall be a visitor. 

But not without the means of aiding her ; 



The Mothers Story, 85 

And who but I can now supply the means ? 
Here 's the dilemma : how can you be free 
If you 're my debtor ? Yet you must be free, 
And promise to be free ; nor let my gift 
Sway you one jot in trammelling your heart. 
Two years you '11 spend with Mrs. Hammersley ; 
Accepting all Society can offer 
To welcome youth and beauty to its lap ; 
Keeping your heart as open as you can 
To influences and impressions new ; 
For, Mary, bear in mind how young you are ! 
So much iox yott. On my part, I '11 return 
To my own country, and endeavor there 
Once more to rectify the wretched wrong 
That circumscribes me. I shall fail perhaps — 
But we can be prepared for either issue.' 

" Here he was silent, and I said : '■ You 're right, 
And I accept your terms without reserve.' 
We parted, and except a clasp of hands 



86 17te Woman who Dared, 

That lingered in each other, and a glance 

That flashed farewell from eyes enthroning truth, 

There was no outward token of our love. 

" Two years (the longest of my life were they !) 
Emptied their sands at last, and then I wrote 
A letter to him, to the Barings' care. 
Containing one word only ; this : ' Unchanged' 
In the same old familiar room we met : 
Eager I gave my hand ; but he drew back. 
Folded his arms, and said, with half a smile : 
' 'T is not for me ; still am I under ban ! ' 
' I 'm glad of that ! ' cried I ; ' 't will help to show 
How slight, to love like mine, impediments 
Injustice can pile up !' 

" He took my hand, 
And, for the first time, we exchanged a kiss. 
Then we sat down and freely talked. Said he : 
* Baffled in all my efforts to procure 
Reversal of my sentence, I resolved 



The Mothers Story, 87 

To terminate one misery at least : 
Yearly the court compelled me, through my bonds- 
men, 
To render an account of all my income, 
Of which the larger portion must be paid 
For the support of my betrayer, and 
The child, called, by a legal fiction, mine. 
To this annoyance of an annual dealing 
With her attorney, I would put an end ; 
And so I compromised by giving up 
Two thirds of all my property at once. 
This leaves me free from all entanglement 
With her or hers, — though with diminished 
means. 

" ' And now, since still you venture to confide 
Wholly in me, my Mary Merivale, — 
And since you would intrust your happiness 
To one who can but give you love for love, — 
To make our income certain, 't is my plan 



88 The Woman who Dared. 

Straightway my little remnant to convert 

Into a joint annuity, to last 

During our natural lives : this will secure 

A fair, though not munificent support. 

And since for me you put the gay world by. 

And since for you I make no sacrifice, 

Now shape our way of life as you may choose/ 

" This I disclaimed ; but we at last arranged 

That on the morrow, in the presence of 

My poor friend Lucy, and my sister JuHa, 

We two should take each other by the hand 

As emblem of a pledge including all 

Of sacred and inviolable, all 

Of holy and sincere, that man and woman, 

Uniting for connubial purposes, 

And with no purpose foreign to right love, 

Can, with responsible intelligence, 

Give to each other in the face of God, 

And before human witnesses. 



The Mothers Story. 89 

"And so 
The simple rite — if such it could be called — 
Took place. A formal kiss was interchanged, 
And then we all knelt down, and Percival 
Met our hearts' need with such a simple prayer 
As by its quickening and inspiring faith 
Made us forget it was another's voic©, 
Not our own hearts, that spoke. My sister Julia 
Wept, not for me, but for herself, poor child ! 
The chill, the gloom of an unhappy future 
Crept on her lot already, like a mist 
Foreshadowing the storm ; she saw, not distant. 
All the despair of a regretful marriage 
Menacing her and driving forth her children. 
It did not long delay. Her spendthrift lord, 
After a squander of his own estate, 
And after swindling my confiding father 
Of a large sum, deserted wife and children, 
To play the chevalier of industry 
At Baden, or at Homburg, and put on 



90 The Woman who Dared. 

More of the aspect of the beast each day. 
Three children have his blood to strive against. 
Poor Julia ! What she has to live on now 
Was given by Linda's father. We found means, 
Also, to set up our poor sewing-girl. 
My old companion, Lucy, in a trade 
In which she thrives, — she and a worthy hus- 
band. 

"What said my parents.? Well, I wrote them 

soon, 
Relating all the facts without reserve. 
And asking, ' Would it be agreeable to them 
To have a visit from us ? ' They replied, 
' It will not be agreeable, for our house 
Is one of good repute.' — Not three years after, 
A joint appeal came to us for their aid 
To the amount of seven hundred pounds. 
We sent the money, and it helped to smooth 
Their latter days ; perhaps to mitigate 



The Mother's Story. 91 

The anger they had felt ; and yet not they : 
Of the ungenerous words addressed to us 
My father never knew. 

" We met my sisters, 
Through Julia's urging, I beUeve, and proudly 
I let them see what sort of man I 'd chosen. 
We travelled for a time in England ; then, 
In travel and in study, spent three years 
Upon the Continent ; and sailed at last 
For the great land to which my thoughts had 

turned 
So often — for America. Arriving 
Here in New York, we took this little house, 
Scene of so many joys and one great woe ; 
And yet a woe so full of heavenly life 
We should not call it by a mournful name. 

" At length our Linda came to make all bright ; 
And I can say, should the great summoner 
Call me this day to leave you, liberal Heaven 



92 The Woman who Dared. 

More than my share of mortal bliss already 

Would have bestowed. Yes, little Linda came ! 

To spoil us for all happiness but that 

In which she too could share — the dear beguiler ! 

And with the sceptre of her love she ruled us, 

And with a happy spirit's charm she charmed us, 

Artfully conquering by shunning conquest. 

And by obeying making us obey. 

And so, one day, one happy day in June, 

We all sat down together, and her mother 

Told her the story which here terminates." 



IV. 

PARADISE FOUND. 

"^V7"0U might have made it longer," murmured 

Linda, 
Who with moist eyes had Hstened, and to whom 
The time had seemed inexplicably brief. 
Then with an arm round either parent's neck, 
And with a kiss on either parent's cheek, 
She said : " My lot is as the good God gave it ; 
And I 'd not have it other than it is. 
Could a permit from any human lips 
Have made me any more a child of God ? 



94 The Woman who Dared. 

Have made me any more your child, my parents ? 
Have made me any more my own true self? 
Happy, and oh ! not diffident to feel 
My right to be and breathe the common air ? 
Could any form of words approving it 
Have made us three more intimately near ? 
Have made us three more exquisitely dear ? 
Ah ! if it could, our love is not the love 
I hold it now to be — immortal love ! " 

With speechless joy and a new pride they gazed 
Into her fair and youthful countenance. 
Bright with ethereal bloom and tenderness. 
Then smoothing back her hair, the father said : 
" An anxious thought comes to us now and 

then, — 
Comes like a cloud : the thought that we as yet 
Have no provision from our income saved 
For Linda. My few little ventures, made 
In commerce, in a profitable hope. 



Paradise Found, 95 

So adversely resulted that I saw 

My best advance would be in standing still. 

As you have heard, all that we now possess 

Is in a life-annuity which ends 

With two frail lives — your mother's and my own. 

So, should death overtake us both at once, — 

And this I 've looked on as improbable, — 

Our Uttle girl would be left destitute." 

" Not destitute, my father ! " Linda cried ; 

" Far back as thought can go, you taught me 

this : 
To help myself; to seek, in my own mind. 
Companionship forever new and glad. 
Through studies, meditations, and resources 
Which nature, books, and crowded life supply. 
And then you urged me to excel in something ; 
(* Better do one thing thoroughly,' you said, 
' Than fifty only tolerably well,') — 
Something from which, with loving diligence, 



9^ The Woman who Dared, 

I might, should life's contingencies require, 
Wring a support ; — and then, how carefully 
You taught me how to deal with slippery men ! 
Taught me my rights, the laws, the very forms 
By which to guard against neglect or fraud 
In any business — till I 'm half a lawyer. 
You taught me, too, how to protect myself, 
Should force assail me ; how to hold a pistol, 
Carry it, fire it — Heaven save me from the need ! 
And, when I was a very little girl. 
You used to take me round to see the houses 
As they were built ; the clearing of the land ; 
The digging of the cellar ; the foundations ; 
You told me that the sand to make the mortar 
Ought to be fresh, and not the sea-shore sand ; 
Else would the salt keep up a certain moisture. 
And then we 'd watch the framework, and the 

roofing ; 
And you 'd explain the office and the name 
Of every beam, and make me understand 



Paradise Found, 97 

The qualities of wood, seasoning of timber, 
And how the masons, and the carpenters, 
The plasterers, the plumbers, and the slaters, 
Should do their work ; and when they slighted 

it, 
And when the wood-work was too near the flue, 
The flue too narrow, or the draught defective : 
So that, as you yourself have often said, 
I 'm better qualified than half the builders 
To plan and build a house, and guard myself 
From being cheated in the operation. 
Fear not for me, my parents ; spend your income 
Without a thought of saving. And besides. 
Had you not trained me aptly as you have, 
Am I not better — I — than many sparrows ? 
There is a heavenly Father over all ! " 

" Sweet arguer ! " said Percival, " may He 
And his swift angels love and help our Linda ! 
Your mother and myself have tried of late 

5 G 



98 The Woman who Dared, 

To study how and where we might reduce 

Certam expenses that have been, " 

But here 
The dinner-bell broke in ; and lighter thoughts — 
Thoughts that but skim the surface of the mind, 
And stir not its profound — were interchanged 
As now more timely ; for the Percivals 
Lacked not good appetites, and every meal 
Had its best stimulant in cheerfulness. 
" Where shall we go to pass our holidays ? " 
The mother asked : "August will soon be here." 
"What says our Linda t " answered Percival : 
" The seaside or the mountains shall it be t " 
" Linda will go with the majority ! 
You 've spilt the salt, papa ; please throw a little 
Over your shoulder ; there ! that saves a quarrel. 
To me you leave it, do you .'* to decide 
Where we shall go t Then hear the voice of 

wisdom : 
The mountain air is good, I love the mountains ;, 



Paradise Found. 99 

And the sea air is good, I love the sea ; 
But if you two prefer the mountain air, — 
Go to the mountains. On the contrary, — " 
"She's neutral!" cried the father; "what a 

dodger 
This little girl has grown ! Come, now, I '11 cast 
Into the scale my sword, and say we '11 go 
To old Cape Ann. Does any slave object.-* 
None. 'T is a special edict. Pass the peas. 
Our rendezvous shall be off Eastern Point. 
There shall our Linda try the oar again." 

Dinner was ended, and the gas was lit, 
And The Day's last edition had been put 
Into his hand to read, when suddenly 
Turning to Mary, with a sigh he said : 
" Kenrick, I see, is dead — Kenrick, our friend. 
' Died in Chicago on the seventh instant, — 
Leaves an estate valued at seven millions.' " 
" Indeed ! our faithful Kenrick — is he dead } 



100 The Woman who Dared, 

Leaves he a wife ? " — " Probably not, my dear ; 

Three months ago he was a single man ; 

I had a letter from him, begging me, 

If I lacked funds at any time to draw 

On him, and not be modest in my draft." 

" But that was generous ; what did you reply ? " 

" I thanked him for his love, and promised him 

He should be first to hear of wants of mine. 

Now let us to the music-room adjourn. 

And hear what will not jar with our regrets." 

They went ; and Mary mother played and sang ; 

Played the ' Dead March in Saul ' and sang * Old 

Hundred,' 
* Come, ye Disconsolate,' ' When thee I seek ' — 
And finally these unfamihar words : — 



O, give me one breath from that land — 
The land to which all of us go ! 

Even now, O my soul ! art thou fanned 
By the breezes that over it blow. 



Paradise Found, loi 

II. 
By the breezes that over it blow ! 

Though far from the knowledge of sense, 
The shore of that land thou dost know — 

There soon wilt thou go with me hence. 

III. 
There soon wilt thou go with me hence — 

But where, O my soul ! where to be 1 
In that region, that region immense, 

The loved and the lost shall we see .? 



The loved and the lost shall we see ! 

For Love all it loves shall make near ; 
Type and outcome of Love shall it be — 

Our home in that infinite sphere ! 

A day's excursion to a favorite spot — 
Choice nook among the choicest of Long Island, 
(Paradise Found, he called it playfully) — 
Had oft been planned ; and one day Percival 
Said : " Let us go to day ! " — " No, not to-day ! ' 
Cried Linda, with a shudder. — " And why not } 



102 The Woman who Dared, 

It is the very day of all the year ! 

There 's an elastic coolness in the air, 

Thanks to the thunder-shower we had last night : 

A day for out-of-doors ! Your reasons, Linda ? 

Tears in your eyes ! Nay, 1 11 not ask for reasons. 

We will not go." — " Yes, father, let us go. 

Whence came my No abrupt, I could not say ; 

It was a sudden freak, and what it meant 

You know as well as I. Shall we get ready ? " 

"Ay, such a perfect day is rare ; it seems 

To bring heaven nearer to my understanding ; 

Life, life itself is joy enough ! to be, — 

To breathe this ether, see that arch of blue. 

Is happiness." — "But 't is the soul that makes it ; 

What would it be, my father, without love .? " 

" Ay, without love, love human and divine. 

No atmosphere of real joy can be." 

Not long the time mother and daughter needed 
To don their simple, neat habiliments. 



Paradise Found, 103 

A postman handed Percival a letter 

As they descended from the door to take 

The carriage that would bear them to the station ; 

For they must go by rail some twenty miles 

To reach this paradise of Percival's. 

When they were in the cars, and these in motion, 
Percival drew the letter from his pocket, 
And, while he read, a strange expression stole 
Over his features. " Now what is it, father ? " 
Then with a sigh which her quick ear detected 
As one that masked a pleasurable thought, 
He said: "Poor little Linda!" — "And why 

poor ? " 
" Because she will not be so rich again 
In wishes unfulfilled. That grand piano 
You saw at Chickering's — what was the price ? " 
" Twelve hundred dollars only " — " It is yours ! 
That painting you admired so — that by Church — 
What did they ask for it?" — "Two thousand 

dollars." 



I04 The Woman who Dared. 

" 'T is cheap at that. We '11 take it. Whose turn- 
out 

Was it that struck your fancy?" — "Miss Van 
Hagen's!" 

" Well, you shall have one like it, only better. 

Look ! What a charming cottage ! How it stands. 

Fronting the water, flanked by woods and gar- 
dens ! 

For sale, I see. We '11 buy it. No, that house 

Yonder upon the hill would suit us better ; 

Our coachman's family shall have the cottage." 

" What is it all, my father 1 You perplex me/* 

Said Linda, with a smile of anxious wonder. 

" In brief, my little girl," said Percival, 

" You 're grown to be an heiress. Let your mother 

Take in that letter. Read it to her, Linda." 

It was a letter from executors 

Of the late Arthur Kenrick, making known 

That in his several large bequests was one 

Of a full million, all to Percival. 



Paradise Found. 105 

The mother's heart flew to the loved ones gone ; 

She sighed, but not to have them back again ; 

That were a wish too selfish and profane. 

And then, the first surprise at length allayed, 

Calmly, but not without a natural joy 

At being thus lifted to an affluent lot. 

The three discussed their future. Should they 

travel } 
Or should they choose some rural site, and build } 
Paradise Found would furnish a good site ! 
Now they could help how many ! Not aloof 
From scenes of destitution had they kept : 
What joy to aid the worthy poor ! To save 
This one from beggary ! To give the means 
To that forsaken widow, overworked. 
With her persistent cough, to make a trip, 
She and her children, city-pinched and pale. 
To some good inland farm, and there recruit ! 
Many the plans for others they conceived ! 
Many the joyful — 



io6 The Woman who Dared, 

Ah ! a shivering crash ! 
A whirl of sphntered wood and loosened iron ! 
Then shrieks and groans of pain .... 

A broken rail 
Had done it all. Now for the killed and wounded ! 
Ghastly the spectacle ! And happy those 
Whom Death had taken swiftly ! Linda's mother 
Was one of these — a smile upon her lips, 
But her breast marred — peacefully she had 

passed. 
Percival's wound was mortal, but he strove, 
Amid the jar of sense, to fix his mind 
On one absorbing thought — a thought for Linda : 
For she, though stunned, they told him, would 

survive, 

Motherless, though — soon to be fatherless ! 

And something — ah ! what was it ? — must be 

done, 

» 

Done, too, at once. " O gentlemen, come here ! 

Paper and pen and ink ! Quick, quick, I pray 

you ! 



Paradise Found. 107 

No matter ! Come ! A pencil — that will do. 
Help me to make a will — I do bequeathe — 
Where am I ? What has happened ? God be 

with me ! 
Yes, I remember now — the will ! the will I 
No matter for the writing ! Witness ye 
That I bequeathe, convey, and hereby give 
To this my only child, named Linda — Linda — 
God ! What 's my name ? Where was I ? Per- 

cival 
To Linda Percival — Is this a dream ? 
What would I do ? My heart is drowned in blood. 
God help me. Linda — Linda ! " 

Then he died ; 
And, chasing from his face that glare of anguish, 
Came a smile beatific as if angels 
Had soothed his fears and hushed him into calm. 

Her father's cry was all unheard by Linda, 
Or by her mortal senses all unheard. 



io8 The Woman who Dared. 

Perhaps a finer faculty, removed 

From the external consciousness afar, 

Took it all in ; for when she woke at last 

To outward life, and looking round beheld 

No sign of either parent, she sank back 

Into a trance, and lay insensible 

For many hours. Then rallying she once more 

Seemed conscious ; and observing the kind looks 

Of an old woman and a man whose brow 

Of thought contrasted with his face of youth, 

She calmly said : " Don't fear to tell me all ; 

I think I know it all ; an accident 

With loss of life ; my father and my mother 

Among — among the killed. Enough ! Your 

silence 
Explains it now. So leave me for a while. 
Should I need help, I '11 call. You 're very good." 

» 

When they returned, Linda was sitting up 

Against the pillow of the bed ; her hands 



Paradise Found, 109 

.Folded upon her breast ; her open eyes 
Tearless and glazed, as if celestial scenes, 
Clear to the inner, nulled the outer vision. 
The man drew near, touched her upon the 

brow. 
And said, " My name is Henry Meredith." 
She started, and, as on an April sky 
A cloud is riven, and through the sudden cleft 
The sunshine darts, even so were Linda's eyes 
Flooded with conscious lustre, and she woke. 

It was a neatly furnished cottage room 
In which she lay, and nodding eglantine, 
"With its sweet-scented foliage and rath roses, 
Rustled and shimmered at the open window, 
" How long have I been lying here ? " asked 

Linda. 
" Almost two days," said Meredith. — " Indeed ! 
I read, sir, what you 'd ask me, in your looks ; 
And to the question on your mind I answer, 



no The Woman who Dared, 

If all is ready, let the funeral be 

This afternoon. Ay, in the village ground 

Let their remains be laid. The services 

May be as is convenient." " Of what faith 

Were they?" — "The faith of Christ." —" But 

that is vague. 
The faith of Christ.? Mean you the faith hi 

Christ > 
Faith in the power and need of his atonement t " 

" All that I mean is, that they held the faith 

Which was the faith of Christ, as manifest 

In his own words, unwrenched by others' words. 

So to no sect did they attach themselves ; 

But from all sects drew all the truth they could 

In charity ; believing that when Christ 

Said of the pure in heart, 'They shall see God,' 

He meant it ; spoke no fragment of a truth ; 

» 

Deferred no saying, qualifying that ; 
Set no word-trap for unsuspecting souls ; 



Paradise Found, m 

Spoke no oracular, ambiguous phrase, 
Intending merely the vicarious pure ; 
Reserved no strange or mystical condition 
To breed fine points of doctrine, or confound 
The simple-minded and the slow of faith. 
Heart-purity and singleness and love. 
Fertile in loving acts, sole proof of these, 
Summed up for them, my father and my mother, 
All nobleness, all duty, all salvation, 
And all religion." 

With a heavy sigh 
Meredith turned away. " I '11 not discuss 
Things of such moment now," said he. " One 

rock, 
One only rock, amid the clashing waves 
Of human error, have I found, — the rock 
On which Christ built his Church. Heaven show 

you it ! " 
" Heaven show me truth ! let it be on the rock. 
Or in the sand. You '11 say Amen to that t " 



112 The Woma7i who Dared, 

" I say Amen to what the Church approves, 
For I myself am weak and falhble, 
Depraved by nature, reprobate and doomed. 
And ransomed only by the atoning blood 
Of a Redeemer more divine than human. 
But controversy is not timely now : 
The papers, jewels, money, and what clothes 
Could properly be taken, you will find 
In a small trunk of which this is the key. 
At three o'clock the carriage will be ready." 

Linda put forth her hand ; he gravely took it, 

And holding it in both of his the while. 

Said : " Should you lack a friend, remember me. 

I was a witness to your father's death. 

Your mother must have died without a pang. 

He, by a strenuous will, kept death at bay 

A minute, and his dying cry was Linda ! , 

Hardly can he have felt his sufferings. 

Such the intentness of his thought for you ! " 



Paradise Found, 113 

The fount of tears was happily struck at last, 
And Linda wept profusely. Meredith 
Quitted the room ; but the old woman sat 
Beside the bed, her thin and shrunken fingers 
Hiding themselves in Linda's locks of gold, 
Or with a soothing motion parting them 
From a brow fine and white as alabaster. 
At length, like a retreating thunder-storm. 
The sobs grew faint and fainter, and then ceased. 

After a pause, said Linda to the lady, 

" Is he your grandson } " — " Ay, my only one ; 

A noble youth, heir to a splendid fortune ; 

A scholar, too, and such a gentleman ! 

Young ; ay, not twenty-four ! What a career, 

Would he but choose ! Society is his, 

To cull from as he would. He throws by all. 

To be a poor tame priest, and take confessions 

Of petty scandals and delinquencies 

From a few Irish hussies and old women ! " 

H 



114 The Woman who Dared. 

" We all," said Linda, " hear the voice of duty 

In different ways, and many not at all. 

Honor to him who heeds the sacred claim 

At any cost of life's amenities 

And tenderest ties ! We see the sacrifice ; — 

We cannot reckon up the nobleness 

It called for, and must call for to the end." 



LINDA. 

nr^HE news of the great railroad accident 

And of the sudden death of Percival, 
Coming so soon upon intelligence 
Of his rare fortune in the legacy 
From Kenrick, occupied the public mind 
For a full day at least, and then was whelmed 
In other marvels rushing thick upon it. 
The mother and the daughter, who still bore 
The name of Percival, came back from Paris 






ii6 The Woman who Dared, 

At once, on getting the unlooked-for news. 
When Linda, after three weeks had elapsed, 
Re-entered, with a swelling heart, the house 
To her so full of sacred memories, 
She was accosted by an officer 
Who told her he had put his seal on all 
The papers, plate, and jewelry belonging 
To the late Albert Percival, — and asked 
If in her keeping were a watch and ring. 
Also some money, found upon his person : 
If so, would she please give them up, and he, 
Who had authority to take them, would 
Sign a receipt for all such property, 
And then the rightful heir could easily 
Dispose of it, as might seem best to her. 

" The rightful heir ? " gasped Linda, taking in 
Not readily the meaning of the words, — 
"Do you not know that I 'm the rightful heir 
And only child of Albert Percival V 



Linda. 117 

" Pardon me," said the officer, " the child, 
Recognized by the law, is not yourself. 
But Harriet Percival, the only heir, — 
For so the court adjudges, — and to her 
All property, both personal and real, 
Must be made over. She, no doubt, will deal 
Kindly in your peculiar case, and make 
A suitable provision — " 

" Hold ! " cried Linda, 
Her nostrils' action showing generous blood 
As clearly as some matchless courser shows it 
After a mighty race, — " Your business. 
But not your co" .nts ! And yet, pardon me — 
I 'm hasty, — you meant well ; but you would 

have me 
Render you up the watch and pocket-book 
Found on my father s person, and delivered 
To me his daughter. That I '11 only do. 
When more authority than you have shown 
Compels me, and my lawyer bids me yield." 



irS The Woman who Dared, 

" Here is my warrant," said the officer, 

"And my instructions are explicit." Then, 

The spirit of the gentleman disdaining 

The action he was sent for, he rejoined : 

" But the law's letter shall not make me do 

An incivility, perhaps a wrong. 

And so, relying on your truth, I leave you, . 

Assured that you 11 be ready to respond 

To all the law can ask. And now, good day ! " 

Left to her own decisions, Linda sought 

At once the best advice ; and such had been 

Her training, that she was not ignorant 

Who among counsellors were trusted most 

In special ways. Kindly and patiently 

Her case was taken up and thoroughly 

Sifted and tried. No hope ! No flaw ! No case ! 

So craftily had every step been taken. 

With such precaution and such legal care, — 

So diligently had the mesh been woven, 



51 



Linda, 119 

Enclosing Percival and all of his, — 

That nothing could be done except put off 

The payment of the Kenrick legacy 

For some six months, — when it was all made 

over 
To the reputed child, already rich 
Through the law's disposition of the sums 
Which Percival had been compelled to pay. 

After the legal test, with brave composure 
Linda surveyed her lot. Enough was left, 
From sale of jewels that had been her mother's, 
For a few months' support, with frugal care. 
Claim to these jewels and the money found 
Upon her mother's person had been laid 
Too eagerly by the contesting party, 
Who said that Percival, in dying last, 
Was heir to the effects ; but since the claim 
Could only be upheld by proving marriage, 
The claimants sorrowfully gave it up. 



120 The Woman who Dared, 

One day as Linda stood with folded hands 
Before her easel, on which lay a painting 
Of flowers autumnal, grouped with rarest skill, — 
The blue-fringed gentian, the red cardinal, 
With fern and plumy golden-rod intwined, — 
A knock aroused her, and the opened door 
Disclosed a footman, clad in livery. 
Who, hat in hand, asked if a lady might 
Come up to see the pictures. " Certainly," 
Was the reply ; and, panting up the stairs, 
A lady came whose blazonry of dress 
And air of self-assured, aggressive wealth 
Spoke one well pleased to awe servility. 

As when by some forecasting sense the dove 
Knows that the hawk, though out of sight and 

still. 
Is hovering near, even so did Linda feel 
An enemy draw nigh ; felt that this woman, 
Who, spite of marks a self-indulgent life 



Linda, 121 

Leaves on the face, showed vestiges of beauty, 
Was she who first had cast the bitterness 
Into that cup of youth which Linda's father 
Was made to taste so long. 

And yet (how strangely, 
In this mixed web of life, the strands of good 
Cross and inweave the evil ! ) to that wrong 
Might he have tracked a joy surpassing hope, — 
The saving angel who, in Linda's mother. 
Had so enriched his being ; — might have tracked 
(Mysterious thought ! ) Linda herself, his child, 
The crown of every rapture, every hope 

The lady, known as Madame Percival, 
Seated herself and turned a piercing look 
On Linda, who blenched not, but stood erect, 
With calm and serious look regarding her. 
The lady was the first to lower her eyes ; 
She then, with some embarrassment, remarked : 
" So ! you 're an artist ! Will you let me see 



122 The Woman who Dared, 

Some of your newest paintings ? " Linda placed 
Three of her choicest pieces on the easel, 
And madame raised her eyeglass, looked a moment, 
Said, "Very pretty," and then, breaking through 
Further constraint, began : " You may not know 

me ; 
My name is Percival ; you, I suppose, 
Bear the same name by courtesy. 'T is well : 
The law at last has taught you possibly 
Our relative positions. Of the past 
We will say nothing ; no hard thought is left 
Against you in my heart ; I trust I know 
The meaning of forgiveness ; what is due 
To Christian charity. In me, although 
The church has but a frail, unworthy child, 
Yet would I help my enemy ; remove her 
From doubtful paths, and see her fitly placed 
With her own kindred for protection due. 
Hear my proposal now, in your behalf : 
If you will go to England, where your aunts 



Linda, 123 

And relatives reside, — and first will sign 

A paper promising you '11 not return, 

And that you never will resume your suit, — 

I will advance your passage-money, and 

Give you five thousand dollars. Will you do it ? " 

The indignant No, surging in Linda's heart. 
Paused as if language were too weak for it. 
When, in that pause, the opening of the door 
Disclosed a lady younger than the first. 
Yet not unlike in features, though no blonde, 
And of a figure small and delicate. 
" Now, Harriet ! " cried the elder of the two. 
Annoyed, if not alarmed, " you promised me 
You would not quit the carriage." — " Well, what 

then ? 
I changed my mind. Is that a thing uncommon } 
Whom have we here ? The name upon the door 
Is Percival ; and there upon the wall 
I see a likeness of my father. So ! 



124 The Wo7na7i who Dared, 

You, then, are Linda Percival ! the child 

For whom he could abandon me, his first ! 

Come, let me look at you ! " — " Nay, Harriet, 

This should not be. Come with me to the car- 
riage ; 

Come ! I command you." — " Pooh ! And pray, 
who cares 

For your commands } I move not till I please. 

We are half-sisters, Linda, but I hate you." 

" Excuse me," Linda answered quietly, 

" But I see no resemblance to my father 

In you. Your features, form, complexion, all 

Are quite unlike."—" Silence ! We 've had enough." 

"What did she say.?" cried Harriet. "Do not 

heed 
A word of hers ; leave her and come with me." 
" She said, I bear no likeness to my father : 
You heard her ! " — "'T was in malice, Harriet. 
Of course she would say that." — " But I must have 



Linda, 125 

That photograph of him upon the wall : 
'T is unlike any that I 've ever seen." 
And with the word she took it from the nail 
And would have put it in her pocket, had not 
Linda, with sudden grasp, recovered it. 

Darker her dark face grew, when Harriet 

Saw herself baffled ; taking out her purse 

She drew from it a thousand-dollar bill, 

And said, " Will this procure it ? " — " Harriet ! 

You 're mad to offer such a sum as that." 

" Old woman, if you anger me, you '11 rue it ! 

I ask you, Linda Percival, if you 

Will take two thousand dollars for that portrait?" 

And Linda answered : " I '11 not take your money : 

The portrait you may have without a price ; 

I 'm not without a copy." — " Well, I take it ; 

But mark you this : I shall not hate you less 

For this compliance ; nay, shall hate you more ; 

For I do hate you with a burning hatred, 



126 The Woman who Dared, 

And all the more for that smooth Saxon face, 
With its clear red and white and Grecian outline ; 
That likeness to my father (I can see it), 
Those golden ringlets and that rounded form. 
Pray, Madame Percival, where did I get 
This swarthy hue, since Linda is so fair, 
And you are far from being a quadroon ? 
Good lady, solve the riddle, if you please." 

" There ! No more idle questions ! Two o'clock } 
That camel's hair at Stewart's will be sold. 
Unless we go this minute. Such a bargain ! 
Come, my dear, come ! " And so, cajoling, coax- 
ing. 
She drew away her daughter, and the door 
Closed quickly on the two. But Linda stood 
In meditation rapt, as thought went back 
To the dear parents who had sheltered her ; 
Contrasting their ingenuous love sincere 
And her own filial reverence, with the scene 



Linda, 127 

She just had witnessed. So absorbed she was 

In visions of the past, she did not heed 

The opening of the door, until a voice 

Broke in upon her tender revery, 

Saying, " I Ve come again to get your answer 

To my proposal." Tranquillized, subdued 

By those dear, sacred reminiscences, 

Linda, with pity in her tone, replied : 

" Madame, I cannot entertain your offer." 

" And why not, Linda Percival 1 " exclaimed 

The imperious lady. — '' I 'm not bound to give 

My reasons, madame," — " Come, I '11 make the 

sum 
Ten thousand dollars." — " Money could not alter 
My mind upon the subject." — " Look you, Linda ; 
You saw my daughter. Obstinate, self-willed, 
Passionate as a wild-cat, jealous, crafty, 
Reckless in use of money when her whims 
Are to be gratified, and yet at times 
Sordid as any miser, — she '11 not stop 



128 The Woman who Dared. 

At artifice, or violence, or crime, 
To injure one she hates — and you she hates ! 
Now for your sake and hers, I charge you leave 
This country, go to England ; — close at once 
With my most liberal offer." 

" Madame, no ! 
This is my home, my birthplace, and the land 
Of all my efforts, hopes, and aspirations ; 
While I have work to do, here lies my field : 
I cannot quit America. Besides, 
Since candor now is best, I would not take 
A dole from you to save myself from starving." 
The lady's eyes flashed choler. She replied : 
" Go your own gait ; and, when you 're on the 

street. 
As you '11 be soon, blame no one but yourself. 
I 've done my part. Me no one can accuse 
Of any lack of charity or care. 
For three weeks more my offer shall hold good. 
After that time, expect no further grace." 



Linda, 129 

And, with a frown which tried to be disdain, 
But which, rebuked and humbled, fell before 
The pitying candor of plain Innocence, 
Out of the room she swept with all her velvet. 

These interviews had made our Linda feel 

How quite alone in the wide world she stood. 

A letter came, after her parents' death, 

From her aunt, Mrs. Hammersley, requesting 

A loan of fifty pounds, and telling all 

The family distresses and shortcomings : 

How this one's husband had proved not so rich 

As was expected ; how another's was 

A tyrant and a niggard, so close-fisted 

He parcelled out with his own hands the sugar 

For kitchen use ; and how another's still. 

Though amply able to receive their mother, 

A widow now, had yet refused to do it. 

And even declined to make a contribution 

For her support. And so the gossip ran. 

6* T 



I30 The Woinan who Dared. 

The picture was not pleasant. With a sigh 

Not for herself, but others, Linda penned 

A letter to her aunt, relating all 

The events that made her powerless to aid 

Her needy kinsfolk. She despatched the letter, 

Then sat and thought awhile. 

"And now for duty ! " 
She cried, and rose. She could not think of duty 
Except as something grateful to her parents. 
They were a presence so securely felt, 
And so related to her every act, — 
Their love was still so vigilant, so real, 
That to do what, and only what, she knew 
They would approve, was duty paramount ; 
And their approval was the smile of God ! 
Self-culture, work, and needful exercise, — 
This was her simple summing-up of duties 
Immediately before her, and to be 
Fulfilled without more parleying or delay. 
She found that by the labor of a month 



Linda. ^xi 

In painting flowers from nature, she could earn 
Easily sixty dollars. This she did 
For two years steadily. Then came a change. 
From some cause unexplained, her wild-flower 

sketches, 
Which from their novelty and careful finish 
At first had found a ready sale, were now 
In less demand. Linda was not aware 
That these elaborate works, to nature true. 
Had been so multiplied in copies, made 
By hand, or printed by the chromo art, 
As to be sold at prices not one fifth 
As high as the originals had cost. 
Hence her own genius winged the storm and lent 
The color to the cloud, that overhung 
Her prospect, late so hopeful and serene. 

Now came her year of struggle ! Narrow means. 
Discouragement, the haunting fear of debt ! 
One summer day, a day reminding her 



132 The Woman who Dared. 

Of days supremely beautiful, immortal, 

(Since hallowed by undying love and joy), 

A little girl, the step-child, much endeared, 

Of a poor artisan who dwelt near by 

On the same floor with Linda, came to her 

And said : '' You promised me. Miss Percival, 

That some fine day you 'd take me in the cars 

Where I could see the grass and pluck the flowers.' 

"Well, Rachel Aiken, we will go to-day, 

If you will get permission from your father," 

Said Linda, longing for the woodland air. 

Gladly the father gave consent ; and so, 

Clad in her best, the little damsel sat, 

W^hile Linda filled the luncheon-box, and made 

The preparations needful. 

" What is that .? " 
Asked Rachel, pointing to an open drawer 
In which a case of pohshed ebony 
Glittered and caught the eye. " A pistol-case ! " 
"And is the pistol loaded .? " — '' I believe so." 



Linda, 133 

" And will you take it with you ? " — " Well, my 

dear, 
I did not think to do so : would you have me ? " 
" Yes, if we 're going to the woods ; for panthers 
Lurk in the woods, you know." — "I '11 take it, 

Rachel ; 
We call this a revolver. See ! Four times 
I can discharge it." At a block of wood 
She aimed and fired ; then carefully reloaded 
The piece, and put it in a hidden pocket. 

Some ten miles from the city, at a place 

Rich in diversity of wood and water. 

They left the cars. Rachel's delight was wild. 

Never was day so lovely ! Never grass 

So green ! And O the flowers ! " Look, only 

look. 
Miss Percival ! What is it .? Can I pluck 
As many as I want } " — "Ay, that 's a harebell." 
" And O, look here ! This red and yellow flower ! 



134 The Woman who Dared. 

Tell me its name." — "A columbine. It grows 

In clefts of rocks. That 's an anemone : 

We call it so because the leaves are torn 

So easily by the wind ; for aneinos 

Is Greek for wind." — " Oh ! here 's a buttercup ! 

I know that well. Red clover, too, I know. 

Is n't the dandelion beautiful } 

And O, Miss Percival, what flower is this } '* 

" That 's a wild rose." — " What, does the rose 

grow wild .'* 
But is not that delightful ? A wild rose ! 
And I can take as many as I want ! 
I did not dream the country was so fine. 
How very happy must the children be 
Who live here all the time ! 'T is better far 
Than any garden ; for, Miss Percival, 
The flowers are here all free, and quite as pretty 
As garden flowers. O, hark ! Did ever bird 
So sweetly sing ? " — " That was a wood-thrush, 

dear." 



Linda, i35 

" O darling wood-thrush ! Do not stop so soon ! 
Look there, on that stone wall ! What 's that ? " 

— "A squirrel." 
Is that indeed a squirrel ? Are you sure ? 
How I would like a nut to throw to him ! 
What are these little red things in the grass ? " 
" Wild strawberries, my dear." — " Wild straw- 
berries ! 
And can I eat them ? " — " Yes, we '11 take a plate 
And pick it full, and eat them with our dinner." 
" O, will not that be nice ? Wild strawberries 
That we have picked ourselves ! " 

And so the day 
Slid on to noon ; and then, it being hot. 
They crossed a wall into a skirting wood. 
And there sat down upon a rocky slab 
Covered with dry brown needles of the pine. 
And ate their dinner while the birds made music. 
" 'T is a free concert, ours ! " said Rachel Aiken : 
" How nice this dinner ! What an appetite 



13^ The Woman who Dared, 

I 'm having all at once ! My father says 
That I must learn to eat : I soon could learn 
In such a place as this ! I wish my father 
Himself would eat ; he works too hard, I fear ; 
He works in lead : and the lead makes him ill. 
See what nice clothes he buys me ! I 'm afraid 
He pays for me more than he can afford, 
Seeing he has a mother to support 
And a blind sister ; for. Miss Percival, 
I 'm but his step-child, and my mother died 
Two years ago ; then my half-sister died, 
His only little girl, and now he says 
That I am all he has in the wide world 
To love and cherish dearly, — all his treasure. 
What would I give if I could bring him here 
To these sweet woods, away from lead and work ! 

So the child prattled. Then, the gay dessert 

Of berries being ended, Linda sat 

On the rock's slope, and peeled the mosses off 



Linda, 137 

Or looked up through the branches of the pines 
At the sky's bkie, while Rachel played around. 
From tree to tree, from flower to flower, the child 
Darted through leafy lanes, when, all at once, 
A scream roused Linda. 

To her feet she sprang ! 
Instinctively (but not without a shudder) 
She grasped the little pistol she had brought 
At the child's prompting ; from the rock ran down, 
And, at a sudden bend, encountered three 
Young lusty ruffians, while, a few rods off, 
Another lifted Rachel in his arms, 
And to the thicker wood beyond moved on. 
The three stood side by side as if to bar 
The path to Linda, and their looks meant mis- 
chief 
The lane was narrow. "For your life, make 

way ! " 
She cried, and raised the pistol. " No, you don't 
Fool us by tricks like that ! " the foremost said : 



13^ The Woman who Dared, 

" And so, my lady — " But before the word 
Was out there was a Httle pufF of smoke, 
With an explosion, not encouraging, — 
And on the turf the frightened caitiff lay. 
Her road now clear, reckless of torn alpaca, 
Over the scattered branches Linda rushed, 
Till she drew near the leader of the gang. 
Who, stopping, drew a pistol with one hand. 
While with the other he held Rachel fast, 
Placing her as a shield before his breast. 

But Linda did not waver. Dropping into 
The old position that her father taught her 
When to the shooting-gallery they went, 
She fired. An oath, the cry of pain and rage. 
Told her she had not missed her aim, — the jaw 
The ruffian left exposed. One moment more, 
Rachel was in her arms. Taking a path 
Transverse, they hit the pubHc road and entered 
The railroad station as the train came in. 



Linda, 139 

When they were safely seated, and the engine 
Began to throb and pant, a sudden pallor 
Spread over Linda's visage, and she veiled 
Her face and fainted ; yet so quietly. 
But one among the passengers observed it ; 
And he came up, and taking Rachel's place 
Supported Linda ; from a lady near 
Borrowed some pungent salts restorative, 
And finding soon the sufferer was herself, 
Gave Rachel back her seat and took his own. 
But at the city station, when arrived, 
This gentleman came up, and bowing, said : 
" Here stands my private carriage ; but to-day 
I need it not. Let my man take you home." 
Linda demurred. His firm will urged them in, 
And she and Rachel all at once were ridins: 
With easy bowling motion down Broadway. 

The evening papers had this paragraph : 

" In Baker's Woods this morning two young men 



140 The Woman who Dared, 

Were fired on by a female lunatic 
Without a provocation, and one wounded. 
The bullet was extracted. Dr. Payson, 
With his accustomed skill and promptitude, 
Performed the operation ; and the patient 
Is doing well. We learn the unhappy woman — 
She had with her a child — is still at large." 
"I'm glad it was no worse," quoth Linda, smihng. 
She kissed the pistol that had been her mother's, 
Wiped it, and reverently put it by. 



Three summers and an autumn had rolled on 
Since the catastrophe that orphaned Linda. 
Midwinter with its whirling snow had come, 
And, shivering through the snow-encumbered 

streets 
Of the great city, men and women went. 
Stooping their heads to thwart the spiteful wind. 
The sleigh-bells rang, boys hooted, and policemen 
Told each importunate beggar to move on. 



Linda, 141 

In a side street where Fashion late had dwelt, 
But which the up-town movement now had left 
A street for journeymen and small mechanics, 
Dress-makers, masons, farriers, and draymen, 
A female figure might be seen to enter 
A lodging-house, and passing up two flights 
Unlock a door that showed a small apartment 
Neat, with two windows looking on the rear, 
A small recess with a low, narrow bed, 
A sofa, a piano, and three chairs. 
'T was noon, but in the sky no cleft of blue 
Flashed the soft love-light like a lifted lid. 

Clad plainly was the lady we have followed, — 

But with a certain grace no modiste's art 

Could have contrived. Youthful she was, and yet 

A gravity not pertinent to youth 

Gave to her face the pathos of that look 

Which a too early thoughtfulness imparts ; 

And this was Linda, — Linda little changed, 



142 The Woman who Dared, 

Though nearer by four years to womanhood 
Than when we parted from her in the shadow 
Of a great woe. 

Preoccupied she seemed 
Now with some painful thought, and in a slow, 
Half-automatic manner she replenished 
With scanty bits of coal her little stove ; 
Then, with a like absorbed, uncertain air, 
Threw off her cloak and bonnet, and sat down ; 
Motionless sat awhile till she drew forth 
A pocket-book, and from it took a letter. 
And read these words : " You guaranteed the debt 
It now has run three months, and if to-morrow 
It is not paid, we must seek legal help." 
A bill of wood and coal for Rachel's father — 
Some twenty dollars only ! And yet Linda 
Saw not the way to pay it on the morrow. 
He, the poor artisan, on whose account 
She had incurred the liability. 
Lay prostrate with a malady, his last, 



Linda. i43 

In the small room near by, with little Rachel 
His only watcher. What could Linda do ? 
At length, with lips compressed, and up and down 
Moving her head as if to give assent 
To some resolve, now fixed, she took her seat 
At the piano, — from her childhood's days 
So tenderly endeared, and every chord 
Vibrating to some memory of her mother ! 
" Old friend," — she sighed ; then thought awhile 
and sang. 



Help me, dear chords, help me to tell in song 
The grief that now must say to you Farewell ! 
No music like to yours can ease my heart. 

II. 

An infant on her knee I struck your keys, 
And you made sweet my earliest lullaby : 
From you I thought my requiem might come. 

III. 
Hard is the pang of parting, but farewell ! 
Harder the shame would be, if help were not ; 
Go, but your tones shall thrill forevermore. 



144 The Woman who Dared. 



IV. 



Farewell ! And O my mother, dost thou hear ? 
Farewell ! But not to thoughts forever dear. 
Farewell, but not to love — but not to thee ! 



When little Rachel, by her father sent, 
Carrie in to take her lesson the next day, 
Behold, no instrument was in the room ! 
What could it mean ? " We must give up," said 

Linda, 
" Our music for a little while. Perhaps 
I soon shall have my dear piano back." 
Then they went in to see the sufferer. 
A smile lit up his face, — a grateful smile. 
That lent a beauty even to Disease, 
Pale, thin, and hollow-eyed : 

" Is not the air 
Quite harsh to-day.?" he asked. "A searching 

air." 
" So I supposed. I find it hard to breathe. 
Dear lady — but you 've been a friend indeed ! 



Linda, i45 

In my vest-pocket you will find a wallet. 
All that I have is in it. Take and use it. 
A fellow-workman brought me yesterday 
Fifty-two dollars, by my friends subscribed : 
Take from it what will pay for coal and rent. 
To-morrow some one of my friends will come 
To see to what the morrow may require. 
You 've done so much, dear lady, I refrain 
From asking more." — " Ask all that you would 

have." 
" My little Rachel — she will be alone, 
All, all alone in this wide, striving world : 
An orphan child without a relative ! 
Could you make interest to have her placed 
In some asylum ? " — " Do not doubt my zeal 
Or my ability to have it done. 
And should good fortune come to me, be sure 
Rachel shall have a pleasant home in mine." 
" That 's best of all. Thank you. God help you 

both. 

7 J 



14^ The Woman who Dared, 

Now, Rachel, say the little prayer I taught you. 
. . . That was well said. Now kiss me for good 

night. 
That 's a dear little girl ! I '11 tell your mother 
How good and diligent and kind you are ; 
How careful, too, of all your pretty clothes ; 
And what a nurse you Ve been, — how true and 

tender. 
Rachel, obey Miss Percival. Be quick 
To shun all evil. Fly from heedless play- 
mates. 
Close your young eyes on all impurity. 
Cast out all naughty thoughts by holy prayer. 
Love only what is good. Ah ! darling child, 
I hoped to shield you up to womanhood. 
But God ordains it otherwise. May He 
Amid the world's thick perils be your Guide ! 
There ! Do not cry, my darling. All is well 
Sing us some pious hymn. Miss Percival." 
And Linda, with wet eyelids, sang these words. 



Linda, i47 

I. 

Be of good cheer, O Soul ! 

Angels are nigh ; 
Evil can harm thee not, 

God hears thy cry. 



Into no void shalt thou 

Spring from this clay ; 
His everlasting arm 

Shall be thy stay. 

III. 

Day hides the stars from thee. 

Sense hides the heaven 
Waiting the contrite soul 

That here has striven. 

IV. 

Soon shall the glory dawn 

Making earth dim ; 
Be not disquieted, 

Trust thou in Him ! 

" O, thank you ! Every word is true — I know it, 
Sense hides it now, but has not always hid. 



148 The Woman who Dared, 

Remember, Rachel, that I say it here. 
Weighing my words : I know it all is true. 
God bless you both. I 'm very, very happy. 
My pain is almost gone. I '11 sleep awhile." 
Rachel and Linda sat an hour beside him, 
Silently watching. Linda then arose 
And placed her hand above his heart : 't was still. 
Tranquilly as the day-flower shuts its leaves 
And renders up its fragrance to the air. 
From the closed mortal senses had he risen. 



One day the tempter sat at Linda's ear : 

Sat and discoursed — so piously ! so wisely ! 

She held a letter in her hand ; a letter 

Signed Jonas Fletcher. Jonas was her landlord ; 

A man of forty — ay, a gentleman ; 

Kind to his tenants, liberal, forbearing ; 

Rich and retired from active business ; 

A member of the Church, but tolerant ; 



Linda, i49 

A man sincere, cordial, without a flaw 

In habits or in general character ; 

Of comely person, too, and cheerful presence. 

Long had he looked on Linda, and at last 

Had studied her intently ; knew her ways, 

Her daily occupations ; whom she saw, 

And where she went. He had an interest 

Beyond that of the landlord, in his knowledge ; 

The letter was an offer of his hand. 

Of Linda's parentage and history 

He nothing knew, and nothing sought to know. 

He took her as she was ; was well content. 

With what he knew, to run all other risks. 

The letter was a good one and a frank ; 

It came to Linda in her pinch of want. 

Discouragement, and utter self-distrust. 

And thus the tempter spoke and she replied : 

"You 're getting thin ; you find success in art 
Is not a thing so easy as you fancied. 



ISO The Woman who Dared. 

Five years you 've worked at what you modestly 
Esteem your specialty. Your specialty ! 
As if a woman could have more than one, — 
And that — maternity ! I do not speak 
Of the six years you gave your art before 
You strove to make it pay. Methinks you see 
Your efforts are a failure. What 's the end 
Of all your toil 1 Not enough money saved 
For the redemption of your pawned piano ! 
Truly a cheerful prospect is before you : 
To hear your views would edify me greatly." 

" Yes, I am thinner than I was ; but then 

I can afford to be — so that 's not much. 

As for success — if we must measure that 

By the financial rule, 't is small, I grant you. 

Yes, I have toiled, and lived laborious days, 

And Httle can I show in evidence ; 

And sometimes — sometimes, I am sick at heart, 

And almost lose my faith in woman's power 



Linda. ^5^ 

To paint a rose, or even to mend a stocking, 

As well as man can do. What would you have ? " 

" Now you speak reason. Let me see you act it ! 
Abandon this wild frenzy of the hour, 
That would leave woman free to go all ways 
A man may go ! Why, look you, even in art, 
Most epicene of all pursuits in life, 
How man leaves woman always far behind ! 
Give up your foolish striving ; and let Nature 
And the world's order have their way with you." 

" Small as the pittance is, yet I could earn 
More, ten times, by my brush than by my needle." 

" Ah 1 woman's sphere is that of the affections. 
Ambition spoils her — spoils her as a woman." 

" Spoils her for whom ? " 

" For man." 



152 The Woman who Dared, 

" Then woman's errand 
Is not, like man's, self-culture, self-advancement. 
But she must simply qualify herself 
To be a mate for man : no obligation 
Resting on man to qualify himself 
To be a mate for woman ? " 

" Ay, the man 
Lives in the intellect ; the woman's life 
Is that of the affections, the emotions ; 
And her anatomy is proof of it." 

" So have I often heard, but do not see. 

Some women have I known, who could endure 

Surgical scenes which many a strong man 

Would faint at. We have had this dubious talk 

Of woman's sphere far back as history goes : . 

'T is time now it were proved : let actions prove it ; 

Let free experience, education prove it ! 

Why is it that the vilest drudgeries 

Are put on woman, if her sphere be that 



Linda. i53 

Of the affections only, the emotions ? 

He represents the intellect, and she 

The affections only ! Is it always so ? 

Let Malibran, or Mary Somerville, 

De Stael, Browning, Stanton, Stowe, Bonheur, 

Stand forth as proof of that cool platitude. 

Use other arguments, if me you 'd move. 

Besides, I see not that your system makes 

Any provision for that numerous class 

To whom the affections are an Eden closed, — 

The women who are single and compelled 

To drudge for a precarious livelihood ! 

What of their sphere } What of the sphere of those 

Who do not, by the sewing of a shirt, 

Earn a meal's cost } Go tell them, when they 

venture 

On an employment social custom makes 

Peculiarly a man's, — that they become 

Unwomanly ! Go make them smile at that, — 

Smile if they 've not forgotten how to smile." 
7* 



154 The Woman who Dared, 

" I see that you 're befogged, my little woman, 

Chasing this ignis fatuus of the day ! 

Leave it, and settle down as woman should. 

What has been always, must be to the end. 

Always has woman been subordinate 

In mind, in body, and in power, to man. 

Let rhetoricians rave, and theorists 

Spin their fine webs, — bow you to holy Nature, 

And plant your feet upon the eternal fact." 

" The little lifetime of the human race 
You call — eternity ! The other day 
One of these old eternal wrongs was ended 
Rather abruptly ; yet good people thought 
'T was impious to doubt it was eternal. 
Because abuses have existed always. 
May we not prove they are abuses still .^ 
If for antiquity you plead, why not 
Tell us the harem is the rule of nature, 
The one solution of the woman problem ? " 



Linda, 155 

" Does not St. Paul — " 

" Excuse me. Beg no questions. 
St. Paul to you may be infallible, 
But Science is so unaccommodating, 
If not irreverent, she '11 not accept 
His ipse dixit as an axiom. 
Here, in our civilized society, 
Is an increasing host of single women 
Who do not find the means of livelihood 
In the employments you call feminine. 
What shall be done } And my reply is this : 
Let every honest calling be as proper 
For woman as for man ; throw open all 
Varieties of labor, skilled or rough. 
To woman's choice and woman's competition. 
Let her decide the question of the fitness. 
Let her rake hay, or pitch it, if she 'd rather 
Do that than scrub a floor or wash and iron. 
And, above all, let her equality 
Be barred not at the ballot-box ; endow her 



15^ The Woman who Dared. 

With all the rights a citizen can claim ; 

Give her the suffrage ; let her have — by right 

And not by courtesy — a voice in shaping 

The laws and institutions of the land. 

And then, if after centuries of trial, 

All shall turn out a fallacy, a failure, 

The social scheme will readjust itself 

On the old basis, and the world shall be 

The wiser for the great experiment." 

" But is sex nothing ? Shall we recognize 
No bounds that Nature clearly has defined. 
Saying, with no uncertain tone, to one, 
Do this, and to the other. Do thou that } 
The rearing of young children and the care 
Of households, — can we doubt where these be- 
long } 
Woman is but the complement of man • 
And not a monstrous contrariety. 
Co-worker she, but no competitor ! " 



Linda. 157 

" All true, and no one doubts it ! But why doubt 

That perfect freedom is the best condition 

For bringing out all that is best in woman 

As well as man ? Free culture, free occasion, 

Higher responsibility, will make • 

A higher type of femininity, 

Ay, of maternal femininity, — 

Not derogate from that which now we have. 

And which, through laws and limitations old, 

Is artificial, morbid, and distort, 

Except where Nature works in spite of all. 

* Woman is but the complement of man ! ' 

Granted. But why stop there } And why not add, 

Man, too, is but the complement of woman } 

And both are free ! And Nature never meant, 

For either, harder rule than that of Love, 

Intelligent, and willing as the sun." 

" Ah ! were men angels, women something more, 
Your plan might work ; but now, in married life. 



15^ The Woman who Dared, 

One must be absolute ; and who can doubt 
That Nature points unerringly to man ? " 

" Then Nature's pointing is not always heeded. 
Marriage should be a partnership of equals : 
But now the theory would seem to be, 
Man's laws must keep the weaker sex in order ! 
Man must do all the thinking, even for woman ! 
I don't believe it ; woman, too, can think. 
Give her the training and the means of knowl- 
edge. 
* O no ! ' cries man, ' the household and the 

child 
Must claim her energies ; and all her training 
Must be to qualify the wife and mother : 
For one force loses when another gains. 
Since Nature is a very strict accountant ; 
And what you give the thinker or the artist. 
You borrow from the mother and the wife.' 
With equal truth, why not object to man 



Linda, 159 

That what he gives the judge or poUtician 

He borrows from the husband and the father ? 

The wife and mother best are quaUfied 

When you allow the woman breadth of culture, 

Give her an interest in all that makes 

The human being's welfare, and a voice 

In laws affecting her for good or ill. 

To * suckle fools and chronicle small beer ' 

Is not the whole intent of womanhood. 

Even of maternity 't is not the height 

To produce many children, but to have 

Such as may be a blessing to their kind. 

Let it be woman's pure prerogative. 

Free and unswayed by man's imperious pleasure 

(Which now too often is her only law), 

To rule herself by her own highest instincts. 

As her own sense of duty may approve, — 

Holding that law for her as paramount 

Which may best harmonize her whole of nature. 

Educe her individuality, 



i6o The Woman who Dared. 

Not by evading or profaning Nature, 
But by a self-development entire." 

" Enough, enough ! Let us split hairs no longer ! 
You hold a crumpled letter in your hand ; 
You know the writer ; you esteem, respect him ; 
And you 've had time to question your own heart. 
What does it say ? You blush, — you hesitate, — 
That 's a good symptom. Now just hear me out : 
If culture is your aim, how opportune 
A chance is this ! Affluence, leisure, study ! 
Would you help others ? He will help you do it. 
Is health an object ? Soon, exempt from care. 
Or cheered by travel, shall you see restored 
Your early bloom and freshness. Would you find 
In love a new and higher life } You start ! 
Now what 's the matter 1 Do not be a fool, — 
A sentimentalist, forever groping 
After the unattainable, the cloudy. 
Come, be a little practical ; consider 



Linda, i6i 

Your present state : look on that row of nails 
Recipient of your wardrobe ; see that bonnet, 
All out of fashion by at least a month ; 
That rusty water-proof you call a cloak ; 
Those boots with the uneven heels ; that pair 
Of woollen gloves ; this whole absurd array, 
Where watchful Neatness battles Poverty, 
But does not win the victory. Look there ! 
Would not a house on the great avenue 
Be better than these beggarly surroundings ? 
Since you 're heart-free, why not at once say 
Yes?" 

" Sweet fluent tempter, there you hit the mark 1 

Heart-free am I, and 't is because of that 

You 're not entirely irresistible. 

Your plea is simply that which lends excuse 

To the poor cyprian whom we pass in scorn. 

I 've done my utmost to persuade myself 

That I might love this man, — in time might love : 



1 62 The Woman who Dared. 

But all my arguments, enforced by yours, 
Do not persuade me. I must give it up ! 

Never was No administered more gently 
Or more decisively than in her answer 
To the proposal in the crumpled letter. 



Musing before a picture Linda sat. 
" In my poor little range of art," thought she, 
" I feel an expert's confidence ; I know 
These things are unexcelled ; and yet why is it 
They do not bring their value ? Come, I '11 try 
Something more difficult, — put all my skill, 
Knowledge, and work into one little piece." 
Bravely she strove : it was a simple scene, 
* But with accessories as yet untried, 
And done in oil with microscopic care ; 
An open window with a distant landscape, 
And on the window-sill a vase of flowers. 



Linda, 163 

It was a triumph, and she knew it was. 
" Come, little housekeeper," she said to Rachel, 
" We '11 go and seek our fortune." So she put 
Under her arm the picture, and they went 
To show it to the dealer who had bought 
Most of her works. But on her way she met 
A clerk of the establishment, who said : 
" Come into Taylor's here and take an ice ; 
I 'd like to tell you something for your good." 

When they all three were seated. Brown began : 
" You may not see me at the store again ; 
For a ship's cousin wants my place, and so. 
With little ceremony, I 'm dismissed. 
Now, if you 've no objection, tell me what 
The old man gave you for that composition 
In which a bird — a humming-bird, I think — 
Follows a child who has a bunch of flowers." 
" Yes, I remember. Well, 't was fifteen dollars." 
" Whew ! He said fifty. Is it possible } 



164 The Woman who Dared. 

You 've seen the chromo copy, I suppose ? " 
" The chromo ? I Ve seen nothing of a chromo. 
Never has my consent been given to pubHsh ! " 
" That 's little to the purpose, it would seem. 
A hundred thousand copies have been sold 
Of all your pieces, first and last. You stare } " 
A light broke in on Linda. All at once 
The mystery that hung upon her strivings 
Lay solved ; the cloud was lifted ; and she saw 
That all this while she had not weighed her tal- 
ents 
In a false balance ; had not been the dupe 
Of her own aspirations and desires. 
With eyes elate and hope up-springing fresh 
In her glad heart, she cried, "And are you sure.?" 
" 'T is easily confirmed. Go ask the printer ; 
Only my number is below the mark." 

From Brown, then, Linda got particulars. 
Showing 't was not a random utterance. 



Linda. 165 

" 'T is strange," she said, " that I Ve not seen the 

chromos 
At the shop windows." — " Only recently," 
Said he, " have they been sold here in the city ; 
The market has been chiefly at the West. 
The old man thought it policy, perhaps, 
To do it on the sly, lest you should know. 
Well, well, in that bald head of his he has 
A mine! " Then Linda struck the bell, and said : 
" This is my entertainment, Mr. Brown ; 
Please let me pay for it." And Brown's " O no " 
Was not so wholly irresistible 
That Linda did not have her way in this. 
They parted. 

"Why, Miss Percival," said Rachel, 
" You look precisely as you did that day 
You fired the pistol in the woods, — you do ! 
I watched your eye, and knew you would not fail." 
" 'T is to bring down a different sort of game, 
We now go forth." — " But you forget your pistol." 



1 66 The Woman who Dared. 

" This time we shall not need one. Did I not 
Say we were going forth to seek our fortune ? 
Well, Rachel, my dear child, we 've found it, — 

found it." 
" O, I 'm so glad ! (How rapidly you walk !) 
And shall we have the old piano back ? " 
" Ay, that we shall ! And you shall go to-morrow 
And take a present to the poor blind aunt 
And her old mother, — for they love you well." 
" A present ! Why, Miss Percival, there 's noth- 
ing 
I do so love to do as to make presents. 
I 've made three in my lifetime ; one a ring 
Of tortoise-shell ; and one — " 

But here they entered 
A picture-store. A man who stood alert. 
With thumbs hooked in the arm-holes of his vest, 
Advanced to welcome her. The " old man " he, 
Of Brown's narration ; not so very old, 
However ; not quite thirty-five, in fact. 



Linda. 167 

The capital which made his note so good 

Was a bald head ; a head you could not question ; 

A head which was a pledge of solvency, 

A warrant of respectability ! 

The scalp all glossy ; tufts above the ears ! 

This head he cultivated carefully, 

And always took his hat off when he went 

To ask a discount or to clinch a bargain. 

" Ah ! my young friend, Miss Percival," he cried, 

" You 've something choice there, if I 'm not mis- 
taken." 

Linda took off the wrapper from her picture 

And showed it. 

An expression of surprise 

Came to the " old man's " features ; but he hid it 

By making of his hand a cylinder 

And looking through it, like a connoisseur. 

These were his exclamations : " Clever ! Ay ! 

Style somewhat new ; landscape a shade too 
bright ; 



1 68 The Woman who Dared. 

The sky too blue, eh ? Still a clever picture, — 
One of your best. Shall we say twenty dollars ? " 
Taking the picture, Linda said, " Good morning ! 
I 'm in a hurry now, and you '11 excuse me." 
" Will you not leave it t " — " No, I 'm not dis- 
posed 
To part with it at present." — " Thirty dollars 
Would be a high price for it, but to aid you 
I '11 call it thirty." — " Could you not say fifty } " 
" You 're joking with me now. Miss Percival." 
" Then we will end our pleasantry. Good by." 
" Stay ! You want money : I shall be ashamed 
To let my partners know it, but to show 
How far I '11 go for your encouragement — 
Come ! I '11 say fifty dollars." 

The " old man " 
Lowered his head, so that the burnished scalp 
Might strike her eye direct. Impenetrable 
To that appeal, Linda said : " I can get 
A hundred for it, I believe. Good day ! '* 



Linda, 169 

" Stop, stop ! For some time our intent has been 

To make you a small present as a proof 

Of our regard ; now will I merge it in 

A hundred dollars for the picture. Well ? " 

*' Nay, I would rather not accept a favor. 

I must go now, — will call again some day." 

Desperate the " old man " moved his head about 

In the most striking lights, and patted it 

Wildly at last, as if by that mute act 

To stay the unrelenting fugitive. 

In vain ! She glided off, and Rachel with her. 

" Where now. Miss Percival 1 " — " To make a 

call 
Upon a lawyer for advice, my dear." 

Thoughtfully Diggin listened to the case. 
So clearly stated that no part of it 
Was left to disentangle. " Let me look," 
He said, " at your new picture ; our first step 
Shall be to fix the right of publication 
8 



170 The Woman who Dared. 

In you alone. Expect from me no praise, — 
For I 'm no judge of art. Fine points of law, 
Not fine points in a picture, have engaged 
My thoughts these twenty years. While you wait 

here, 
I '11 send my clerk to copyright this painting. 
What shall we call it .? " — " Call it, if you please, 
' The Prospect of the Flowers.' " — " That will do. 
Entered according to — et cetera. 
Your name is — " "Linda Percival." — "I thought 

so. 
Here, Edward, go and take a copyright 
Out for this work, * The Prospect of the Flowers.' 
First have it photographed, and then deposit 
The photographic copy with the Court." 

Then Diggin paced the room awhile, and ran 
Through his lank hair his fingers nervously. 
At length his plan took shape ; he stopped and 
said 



Linda. 171 

" You shall take back your picture to this dealer ; 
Tell him 't is not for sale, but get his promise 
To have it, for a fortnight, well displayed 
At his shop window. This he '11 not refuse. 
Don't sell at any price. What 's your address .? 
Edward shall go with you : 't is well to have 
A witness at this juncture. Write me down 
The printer's name Brown gave you. Ay, that 's 

right. 
Now go ; and if the picture is removed — 
For purposes we '11 not anticipate — 
As it will be — we '11 corner the ' old man,' 
And his bald head sha' n't save him. By the way, 
If you want money let me be your banker ; 
I 'm well content to risk a thousand dollars 
On the result of my experiment." 

The picture was removed, as he foretold. 
Ten weeks went by ; then Linda got it back. 
" It is the pleasant season," said the lawyer ; 



172 The Woman who Dared. 

" Here are three hundred dollars. You start 

back ! 
Miss Linda, I shall charge you ten per cent 
On all you borrow. Oh ! You do not like 
To be in debt. This is my risk, not yours. 
If I recover nothing, then no debt 
Shall be by you incurred, — so runs the bond ! 
Truly, now, 't is no sentimental loan : 
I trust another's solvency, not yours. 
At length you understand me, — you consent ! 
Now do not go to work ; but you and Rachel 
Go spend a long vacation at the seaside. 
You want repose and sunshine and pure air. 
Be in no hurry to return. The longer 
You 're gone, the better. For a year at least 
We must keep dark. That puzzles you. No 

matter. 
Here, take my card, and should you any time 
Need money, do not hesitate to draw 
On me for funds. There ! Not a word ! Good 

by!" 



Linda. 173 

In the cars, eastward bound ! A clear, bright day- 
After a rain-storm ; and, on both sides, verdure ; 
Trees waving salutations, waters gleaming. 
The brightness had its type in Linda's looks, 
As, with her little protegee, she sat 
And savored all the beauty, all the bloom. 
On the seat back of them, two gentlemen 
Chatted at intervals in tones which Linda 
Could hardly fail to hear, though little heeding. 
But now and then, almost unconsciously, 
She found herself attending to their prattle. 
Said Gossip Number One : " You see that veteran 
In the straw hat, and the young man beside him : 
Father and son are they. Old Lothian, 
Five months ago, was high among the trusted 
Of our chief bankers ; Charles, his only son. 
By a maternal uncle's death enriched. 
Kept out of Wall Street ; turned a stolid ear 
To all high-mounting schemes for doubling wealth, 
His taste inclining him to art and letters. 



1/4 The Woman who Dared, 

But Lothian had a partner, Judd, — a scamp, 
As the result made evident ; and Judd 
One day was missing ; bonds, securities. 
And bills, deposits of confiding folk. 
Guardians, and widows, and old men retired. 
All had been gobbled up by Judd — converted 
Into hard cash — and Judd had disappeared. 
Despair for Lothian ! a man whose word 
No legal form could make more absolute. 
Crushed, mortified, and rendered powerless, 
He could not breast the storm. The mental 

strain 
Threw him upon his bed, and there he lay 
Till Charles, from Italy in haste returning, 
Found his old sire emaciate and half dead 
From wounded honor. ' Come ! no more of this ! ' 
Cried Charles ; ' how happened it that you forgot 
You had a son ? All shall be well, my father.' 
He paid off all the liabilities. 
And found himself without three thousand dollars 



Linda. 175 

Out of a fortune of at least a million. 

What shall we call him, imbecile or saint ? 

His plan is now to set up as a teacher. 

Of such a teacher let each thrifty father 

Beware, or he may see his only son 

Turn out a poor enthusiast, — perhaps — 

Who knows .? — an advocate of woman's rights ! " 

Attracted by the story, Linda tried 

To get a sight of him, the simpleton ; 

And, when she saw his face, it seemed to her 

Strangely familiar. Was it in a dream 

That she had once beheld it ? Vain the attempt 

Of peering memory to fix the where 

And when of the encounter ! Yet she knew 

That with it was allied a grateful thought. 

Then Rachel spoke and made the puzzle clear : 

" The man who sent us in his carriage home. 

That day you fainted, — don't you recollect ? " 

" Ay, surely ! 't is the same. No dream-face that ! 



\^6 The Woman who Dared, 

Charles Lothian, is he ? If his acts are folly, 
Then may I be a fool ! Such fools are rare. 
How tender of his father he appears ! 
I wonder where they 're going." 

When, at Springfield, 
Father and son got out, a sigh, or rather 
The ghost of one, and hardly audible, 
Escaped from Linda. Then Charles Lothian, 
While the cars waited, caught her eye, and bowed. 
So he remembered her ! " Now that was odd. 
But the bell sounds ; the locomotive puffs ; 
The train moves on. Charles Lothian, good by I 
Eastward we go ; away from you — away — 
Never to meet again in this wide world ; — 
Like ships that in mid-ocean meet and part. 
To meet no more — O, nevermore — perchance ! " 



VI. 

BY THE SEASIDE. 

BORNE swiftly to the North Cape of the Bay, 
Still on the wings of steam the travellers 
went ; 
And tenderly the purple sunset smiled 
Upon their journey's end ; a little cottage 
With oaks and pines behind it, and, before, 
High ocean crags, and under them the ocean, 
Unintercepted far as sight could reach ! 
Foliage and waves ! A combination rare 



i^S The Woman who Dared, 

Of lofty sylvan table-land, and then — 

No barren strip to mar the interval — 

The watery waste, the ever-changing main ! 

Old Ocean, with a diadem of verdure 

Crowning the summit where his reach was stayed ! 

The shore, a line of rocks precipitous, 

Piled on each other, leaving chasms profound. 

Into whose rifts the foamy waters rushed 

With gurgling roar, then flowed in runlets 

back 
Till the surge drove them furiously in. 
Shaking with thunderous bass the cloven granite ! 
Yet to the earth-line of the tumbled cliffs 
The wild grass crept ; the sweet-leafed bayberry 
Scented the briny air ; the fern, the sumach. 
The prostrate juniper, the flowering thorn. 
The blueberry, the clinging blackberry. 
Tangled the fragrant sod ; and in their midst 
The red rose bloomed, wet with the drifted 

spray. 



By the Seaside. 179 

From the main shore cut off, and isolated 

By the invading, the circumfluent waves, 

A rock which time had made an island, spread 

With a small patch of brine-defying herbage. 

Is known as Norman's Woe ; for, on this rock, 

Two hundred years ago, was Captain Norman, 

In his good ship from England, driven and 

wrecked 
In a wild storm, and every life was lost 

Stand on the cliff near by, — southeasterly 

Are only waves on waves to the horizon ; 

But easterly, less than two miles across. 

And forming with the coast-line, whence you 

look. 
The harbor's entrance, stretches Eastern Point, 
A lighthouse at its end ; a mile of land 
Arm-like thrust out to keep the ocean off ; 
So narrow that beyond its width, due east, 
You see the Atlantic glittering, hardly made 
Less inconspicuous by the intervention. 



i8o The Woman who Dared, 

The cottage fare, the renovating breeze, 
The grove, the piny odors, and the flowers. 
Rambles at morning and the twilight time, 
Sea-bathingj joyous and exhilarant, 
Siestas on the rocks, with inhalations 
Of the pure breathings of the ocean-tide, — 
Soon wrought in both the maidens visible change. 
Each day their walks grew longer, till at last 
A ten-mile tramp was no infrequent one. 

" And where to-day ? " asked Rachel, one fair 

morning. 
" To Eastern Point," said Linda ; " with our 

baskets ! 
For berries, there 's no place like Eastern Point ; 
Blackberries, whortleberries, pigeon-pears, — 
All we shall find in prodigality ! " 
And so by what was once the old stage-road 
Contiguous to the shore, and through the 

woods, — 



By the Seaside, i8i 

Though long abandoned save by scenery-hunters, 
And overgrown with grass and vines and 

bushes ; 
Then leaving on their right the wooded hill 
Named from the rattlesnakes, now obsolete ; 
Then by the Cove, and by the bend of shore 
Over Stage-rocks, by little Half-moon beach. 
Across the Cut, the Creek, by the Hotel, 
And through the village, even to Eastern Point, — 
The maidens went, and had a happy day. 
And, when the setting sun blazed clear and mild, 
And every little cloud was steeped in crimson, 
To a small wharf upon the harbor side. 
Along the beach they strolled, and looked across 
The stretch of wave to Norman s Woe ; — and 

Linda 
Wistfully said : " Heigho ! I own I 'm tired ; 
And you, too, Rachel, you look travel-worn, 
And hardly good for four miles more of road. 
Could we but make this short cut over water ! 



1 82 The Woman who Dared, 

What would I give now for a boat to take us 
To Webber's Cove ! O, if some timely oarsman 
Would only come and say, '■ Fair demoiselles, 
My skiff lies yonder, rocking on the tide, 
And eager to convey you to your home ! ' 

Then would I Rachel ! " 

" What, Miss Percival ? " 
" Look at those men descending from the ridge ! " 
" Well, I can see an old man and a young." 
" And is that all you have to say of them ? " 
" How should I know about them ? Ah ! I see ! 
Those are the two we met three weeks ago, — 
The day we left New York, — met in the cars." 
"Ay, Rachel, and their name is Lothian ; 
Father and son are they. Who would have 

thought 
That they would find their way to Eastern 

Point ? " 
" Why not, as well as we, Miss Percival } 
Look ! To the wharf they go ; and there, beside 

it, 



By the Seaside, 183 

If I 'm not much mistaken, lies a boat. 
The wished-for oarsman he ! O, this is hick ! 
They 're going to the boat, — he '11 row us over, 
I '11 run and ask him. See you to my basket." 
" Rachel ! Stop, Rachel ! Fie, you forward girl ! 
Don't think of it : come back ! back, back, I 
say ! " 

But Rachel did not hear, or would not heed. 
Straight to the boat she ran, and, as the men 
Drew nigh and stopped, — to Linda's dire dismay 
She went up and accosted them, and pointed 
To Norman's Woe, — then back to her com- 
panion, — 
And then, with gesture eloquent of thanks 
For some reply the younger man had made. 
She seemed to lead the way, and he to follow 
Along the foot-path to the granite bench 
Where Linda sat, abashed and wondering. 
And, when they stood before her, Rachel said 



184 The Woman who Dared. 

" Miss Percival, here '& Mr. Lothian ; 
He has a boat near by, and will be glad 
To give us seats and row us both across." 
Charles Lothian bowed, and Linda, blushing, 

said, 
" Against my orders did this little lady 
Accost you, sir, but I will not affect 
Regret at her success, if you 're content." 
" More than content, I 'm very glad," said Charles ; 
" My boat is amply large enough for four, 
And we are bound, it seems, all the same way. 
My father and myself have taken rooms 
At Mistress Moore's, not far from where you live : 
So count your obligation very slight." 
" An obligation not the first ! " said Linda. 
" So much the better ! " said Charles Lothian : 
" Come, take my arm, and let me hold your 

basket. 
What noble blackberries ! I '11 taste of one." 
"Why not of two } As many as you will } " 



By the Seaside. 185 

"Thank you. You Ve been adventurous, it 

seems." 
" Yes, Fortune favors the adventurous : 
See the old proverb verified to-day ! " 
"Praise a good day when ended. Here 's my 

father : 
Father, Miss Percival ! " The senior bowed, 
And said, " I used to know — " And then, as if 
Checked by a reminiscence that might be 
Unwelcome, he was silent, and they went 
All to the boat. " Please let me take an oar," 
Said Linda. " Can you row } " asked Charles. 

"A little! 
My father taught me." Then old Lothian 
Looked at her with a scrutinizing glance. 

The ocean billows melted into one. 
And that stretched level as a marble floor. 
All winds were hushed, and only sunset tints 
From purple cloudlets, edged with fiery gold, 



1 86 The Woman who Dared. 

And a bright crimson fleece the sun had left, 
Fell on the liquid plain incarnadined. 
The very pulse of ocean now was mute ; 
From the far-off profound, no throb, no swell ! 
Motionless on the coastwise ships the sails 
Hung limp and white, their very shadows white. 
The lighthouse windows drank the kindling red. 
And flashed and gleamed as if the lamps were lit. 

" A heavenly eve ! " sighed Linda, rapt in praise. 
As with poised oars the two looked oceanward. 
Then, keeping time, they pulled out from the 

shore. 
*' But you row well ! " cried Charles. " I might 

return 
The compliment," said Linda. " See that duck ! 
How near, how still he floats ! He seems to know 
The holy time will keep him safe from harm." 
" Had I a gun," said Charles — " You would 

not use it," 



By the Seaside, 187 

Cried Linda, flushing. "And why not?" quoth 
he. 

" * Nobility obliges ' ; sympathy 

Now makes all nature one and intimate ; 

And we 'd respect, even in a duck, his share 

In this tranquillity, this perfect rest." 

" I 'm glad, then, that I 'm gunless," Charles re- 
plied. 

" Hear him ! " the sire exclaimed ; " he 'd have you 
think 

He 's a great sportsman. Be not duped, my 
dear ! 

He will not shoot nor fish ! He got a wound 

At Gettysburg, I grant you, — what of that } 

He would far rather face a battery 

Than kill a duck, or even hook a cunner." 

" See now," said Charles, " the mischievous effect 

Of this exhilarating Cape Ann air ! 

'T is the first taunt I 've heard from lips of his 

Since my return from Europe. Look you, 
father. 



1 88 The Woman who Dared. 

If I 'm to be exposed before young ladies, 
Your rations shall be stopped, and your supply 
Of oxygen reduced,. — with no more joking. 
Don't eye those berries so feloniously. 
Because you 've. now an appetite, — because 
You've just begun to gain a httle flesh, — 
Must I be made the target of your jeers ?" 

Smiling, but with sad eyes, the father said : 
" Ah ! Charlie, Charlie, when I think of it, — 
Think how you Ve thrown, poor boy, your very 

life 
Into the breach of ruin made for me, — 
Sacrificed all, to draw the lethal dart 
Out of my wounded honor — to restore — " 
" Give us a song, Miss Percival, a song ! " 
Charles, interrupting, said. " The time, the place, 
Call for a song. Look ! All the lighthouses 
Flash greeting to the night. There Eastern 

Point 



By the Seaside. 189 

Flames out ! Lo, little Ten Pound Island follows ! 

See Baker's Island kindling ! Marblehead 

Ablaze ! Egg Rock, too, off Nahant, on fire ! 

And Boston Light winking at Minot's Ledge ! 

Like the wise virgins, all, with ready lamps ! 

Now might I turn fire-worshipper, and bow 

In adoration at this solemn rite : 

I '11 compromise, however, for a song." 

"Lest you turn Pagan, then, I '11 sing," quoth 

Linda. 
And, while they rested on their oars, she sang. 

LINDA'S SONG. 

A little bird flew 

To the top of a tree : 
The sky it was blue, 
And the bird sang to me. 
So tender and true was the strain 
The singer, I hoped, would remain : 
O little bird, stay and prolong 
The rapture the grief of that song ! 



1 90 The Woman who Dared. 

A little thought came, 

Came out of my heart ; 
It whispered a name 
That made me to start : 
And the rose-colored breath of my sigh 
Flushed the earth and the sea and the sky. 
Delay, little thought ! O, delay. 
And gladden my life with thy ray ! 

" Such singing lured Ulysses to the rocks ! " 
Old Lothian said, applauding. " Charles, look out, 
Or, ere we reck of it, this reckless siren 
Will have us all a wreck on Norman's Woe. 

See to your oars ! Where are we drifting, man } " 
" Who would not drift on such a night as this } " 
Said Charles ; " all 's right." Then, heading for 

the Cove, 
Slowly and steadily the rowers pulled. 

But, when the moon shone crescent in the west, 
And the faint outline of the part obscured 
Thread-like curved visible from horn to horn, — 



By the Seaside, 191 

And Jupiter, supreme among the orbs, 
And Mars, with rutilating beam, came forth. 
And the great concave opened Hke a flower. 
Unfolding firmaments and galaxies. 
Sparkling with separate stars, or snowy white 
With undistinguishable suns beyond, — 
They paused and rested on their oars again, 
And looked around, — in adoration looked. 
For, gazing on the inconceivable, 
They felt God is, though inconceivable ; — 
And, while they mutely worshipped, suddenly 
A change came over Linda's countenance. 
And her glazed mortal eyes were functionless ; 
For there, before her in the boat, stood two 
Unbidden, not unwelcome passengers, 

Her father and her mother 

*' Why, Miss Linda, 
Wake ! Are you sleeping ? What has been the 

matter ? 
Here we 've been waiting for you full five minutes. 



192 The Woman who Dared. 

And I have called, and Mr. Lothian 
He too has called, and yet you make no answer ! " 
" Rachel ! What is it ? There ! Excuse me all. 
If I seemed impolite. Now, then, I 'm ready. 
A strong pull shall it be } So ! Let her dart ! " 

And in ten minutes they were at the landing 
And on their homeward way ; and, as they parted. 
The spoils were shared, and the old man accepted 
One of Jthe baskets, and all cried, " Good night ! " 



The morning sea-fog like an incense rose 
Up to the sun and perished in his beam ; 
The sky's blue promise brightened through the 

veil. 
With her unopened sketch-book in her hand, 
Linda stood on the summit looking down 
On Norman's Woe, and felt upon her brow 
The cooling haze that foiled the August heat. 



By the Seaside. 193 

Near her knelt Rachel, hunting curiously 
For the fine purple algae of the clefts. 
Good cause had Linda for a cheerful heart ; 
For had she not that day received by mail 
A copy of " The Prospect of the Flowers," — 
Published in chromo, and these words from 

Diggin ? 
" Your future is assured : my bait is swallowed, 
Bait, hook, and sinker, all ; now let our fish 
Have line enough and time enough for play. 
And we will land him safely by and by. 
A good fat fish he is, and thinks he 's cunning. 
Enclosed you '11 find a hundred-dollar bill ; 
Please send me a receipt. Keep very quiet." 

Yet Linda was not altogether happy. 
Why was it that Charles Lothian had called 
Once, and once only, after their adventure t 
Called just to ask her. How she found herself.? 
And, Did she overtask herself in rowing } 

9 ^ M 



194 The Woman who Dared, 

How happened it, in all her walks and rambles, 
They rarely met, or, if they met, a bow 
Formal and cold was all the interview ? 
While thus she mused, she started at a cry : 
" Ah 1 here 's our siren, cumbent on the rocks ! 
Where should a siren be, if not on rocks ? " 
Old Lothian's voice ! He came with rod and line 
To try an angler's luck. Behind him stepped 
Charles, who stood still, as if arrested, when 
He noticed Linda. 

Then, as if relenting 
In some resolve, he jumped from rock to rock 
To where she leaned ; and, greeting her, inquired : 
" Have you been sketching } " — " No, for indo- 
lence 
Is now my occupation." — " Here 's a book ; 
May I not look at it ? " — " You may." — " Is this 
An album?" — "'T is my sketch-book." — " Do 

you mean 
These are your sketches, and original t " 



By the Seaside. i95 

" Ay, truly, mine ; from nature every one." 
" But here we have high art ! No amateur 
Could color flower like that." — "Ah ! there you 

touch me ; 
For I 'm no amateur in painting flowers, — 
I get my living by it." — " I could praise 
That sea-view also, — what a depth of sky ! 
That beach, — that schooner flying from a squall, — 
If I 'm a judge, here 's something more than skill ! " 

Then the discourse slid ofl" to woman's rights ; 
For Lothian held a newspaper which told 
Of some convention, the report of which 
Might raise a smile. One of the lady speakers, 
It seems, would give her sex the privilege 
Of taking the initiative in wooing, 
If so disposed ! 

" Indeed, why not .'* " cried Linda. 
" Indeed, you almost take my breath away 
With your Why not. Miss Percival ! Why not t " 



19^ The Woman who Dared. 

" Yes, I repeat, — if so disposed, why not ? 
For why should woman any more than man 
Play the dissembler, with so much at stake ? 
I know the ready taunt that here will rise : 
' Already none too backward are our girls 
In husband-seeking.' Seeking in what way ? 
Seeking by stratagem and management, — 
Not by frank, honest means ! What food for mirth 
'T would give to shallow men to see a woman 
Court the relation, intertwined with all 
Of purest happiness that she may crave, — 
The ties of wife and mother ! O, what pointing, 
Sneering, and joking ! And yet why should care 
Thoughtful and pure and wisely provident. 
That Nature's sacred prompting shall not fail, 
Be one thing for a man, and quite another 
For her, the woman ? Why this flimsy mask. ? 
This playing of a part, put on to suit, 
Not the heart's need, but Fashion custom-bound ? 
Feigning we must be sought, and never seek ? 



By the Seaside, 197 

Now, through these social hindrances and bars, 
The bold, perhaps the intriguing, carry off 
Prizes the true and modest ought to win. 
And so we hear it coarsely said of husbands, 
* Better a poor one far, than none at all ! ' 
A thought ignoble, and which no true woman 
Should harbor for a moment. Give her freedom. 
Freedom to seek, and she '11 not harbor it ! 
Because if woman, equally with man, 
Were privileged thus, she would discriminate 
Much more than now, and fewer sordid unions 
Would be. the sure result. For what if man 
Were chained to singleness until some woman 
Might seek his hand in marriage, would he be 
Likely as now to make a wise election } 
Would he not say, ' Time flies ; my chances lessen 
And I must plainly take what I can get t ' 
True, there are mercenary men enough. 
Seeking rich dowries ; they 'd find fewer dupes. 
Were women free as men to seek and choose, 



198 The Woman who Dared. 

Banish the senseless inequahty, 

And you make marriage less a vulgar game 

In which one tries to circumvent the other. 

Oh ! all this morbid ribaldry of meUy 

And all this passive imbecility, 

And superstitious inactivity, 

Dissimulation and improvidence. 

False shame and lazy prejudice oi women, 

Where the great miracle of sex concerns us. 

And Candor should be innocently wise. 

And Knowledge should be reverently free, — 

Is against nature, — helps to hide the way 

Out of the social horrors that confound us, 

And launches thousands into paths impure. 

Shutting them out from holy parentage." 

" I hold," said Charles, " the question is not one 
Of reasoning, but of simple sentiment 
As it would shock me, should a woman speak 
In virile baritone, so would I shudder 



By the Seaside, 199 

To hear a grave proposal marriageward 
In alto or soprano." 

" 'T would depend ! 
Depend on love," said Linda ; " love potential, 
Or present." — "Nay, 't would frighten love!" 

cried Charles, — 
" Kill it outright." — " Then would it not be love ! 
What ! would you love a woman less because 
She durst avow her love, before the cue 
Had been imparted by your lordly lips ? 
Rare love would that be truly which could freeze 
Because the truth came candid from her heart. 
And in advance of the proprieties ! " ^1^ 

" But may the woman I could love," cried 

Charles, 
" Forbear at least the rash experiment ! " 
" I doubt," said Linda, " if you know your heart ; 
For hearts look to the substance, not the form. 
Why should not woman seek her happiness 
With brow as unabashed as man may wear 



200 The Woman who Dared. 

In seeking his ? Ah ! lack of candor here 
Works more regrets, for woman and for man, 
Than we can reckon. Let but woman feel 
That in the social scheme she 's not a cipher. 
The remedy, be sure, is not far off." 

"To me it seems," said Lothian, " that you war 
Against our natural instincts : have they not 
Settled the point, even as the world has done ? ' 
Said Linda : " Instincts differ ; they may be 
Results of shallow prejudice or custom. 
The Turk will tell you that polygamy 
Is instinct ; and the savage who stalks on 
In dirty painted grandeur, while his squaw 
Carries the burdens, might reply that instinct 
Regulates that. So instinct proves too much. 
Queens and great heiresses are privileged 
To intimate their matrimonial choice, — 
Simply because superiority 
In power or riches gives an apt excuse : 



By the Seaside. 201 

Let a plurality of women have 

The wealth and power, and you might see reversed 

What now you call an instinct. When a higher 

Civilization shall make woman less 

Dependent for protection and support 

On man's caprice or pleasure, there may be 

A higher sort of woman ; one who shall 

Feel that her lot is more in her own hands, 

And she, like man, a free controlling force, 

Not a mere pensioner on paternal bounty 

Until some sultan throws the handkerchief" 

A cry of triumph from the fisherman, 

Exuberant at having caught a bass, 

Here ended the discussion, leaving Linda 

With the last word. Charles went to chat with 

Rachel ; 

And Linda, summoned by vociferations 

From the excited, the transported captor. 

Descended to inspect the amazing fish. 
9* 



202 The Woman who Dared, 

" A beauty, is it not, Miss Percival ? 

A rare one, too, for this part of the coast ! 

'T will be a study how to have it cooked. 

Now sit here, in the shadow of this rock. 

Your father's name was Albert Percival } 

So I supposed. I 've often heard my wife 

Speak of himx as of one shp knew was wronged 

Most foully in his wrestle with the law. 

Have you not met with Harriet Percival V 

" Once only, and our interview was brief. 

Is she not married } " — " No, nor like to be, 

Although her fortune is a pretty one, 

Even for these times, — two millions, I believe ; 

All which her mother may inherit soon ; 

For Harriet is an invalid, but hoards 

Her income quite as thriftily as if 

She looked for progeny and length of days. 

The mother, as you may not be aware. 

Has married an aspiring gentleman 

Who means to build a palace on the Hudson, 

And Harriet's money hence is greatly needed." 



By the Seaside. 203 

The mist now cleared, and the sun shone in 

power, 
So that the heat soon drove them to the woods. 
The senior took his capture home for dinner ; 
Rachel strolled, picking berries by the brook; 
And, under lofty pines, sat Charles and Linda, 
And talked discursively, till Linda's thoughts. 
Inclining now to memory, now to hope. 
Vibrating from the future to the past. 
Took, in a silent mood, this rhythmic form. 

UNDER THE PINES. 

O pine-trees ! bid the busy breeze be still 
That through your tops roars Hke the constant surge : 
Such was the sound I heard in happy days 
Under the pines. 

In happy days, when those I loved were by; 
In happy days, when love was daily food ; 
And jocund childhood, finding it, found joy 
Under the pines. 



204 The Woman who Dared. 

Again I hear the west-wind in your tops ; 
Again I scent the odor you exhale ; 
But sound and odor now provoke but tears 
Under the pines. 

O pine-trees ! shall a different joy be mine, 
One day when I shall seek your fragrant shade ? 
Whisper it faintly, breezes, to my heart 
Under the pines 

" Truly, Miss Percival, you puzzle me," 
Said Charles, upon her silent revery 
Breaking abruptly in : " ay, you could fire 
And wound the villain bearing off the child, 
And you can brave the radical extreme 
On this great woman question of the day, — 
Yet do you seem a very woman still. 
And not at all like any man I know, — 
Not even like an undeveloped man ! 
And I 'm not greatly exercised by fear. 
Leaning here by your side thus lazily." 
" Don't mock me now," said Linda ; " I 'm not 
armed ; 



By the Seaside, 205 

Be generous, therefore, in your raillery." 
" Not armed ? Then will I venture to propose 
That when the tide is low this afternoon 
We try the beach on horseback. Will you ven- 
ture } " 
The joy that sparkled in her eyes said "Yes" 
Before her tongue could dupUcate assent. 
Said Charles, " I '11 bring the horses round at six." 
" I will be ready, Mr. Lothian." 

There was no breach of punctuality : 

Though sighs, from deeper founts than tears, were 

heaved, 
When she drew forth the summer riding-habit 
Worn last when in the saddle with her father. 
" Here are the horses at the door ! " cried Rachel ; 
"A bay horse and a black ; the bay is yours." 
When they were mounted, Lothian remarked : 
" Little Good Harbor Beach shall be our point ; 
So called because an Indian once pronounced 



2o6 The Woman who Dared. 

The harbor 'little good,' meaning 'quite bad' ; 
A broad and open beach, from which you see. 
Running out southerly the ocean side 
Of Eastern Point ; its lofty landward end 
Gray with huge cliffs. There shall you mark 

' Bass Rock,' 
Rare outlook when a storm-wind from the east 
Hurls the Atlantic up the craggy heights." 

The air was genial, and a rapid trot 

Soon brought them to the beach. The ebb had 

left 
A level stretch of sand, wide, smooth, and hard. 
With not a hoof-mark on the glistening plain. 
The horses tossed their heads with snorting 

pride. 
Feeling the ocean breeze, as curved and fell 
Up the long line the creeping fringe of foam, 
Then backward slid in undulating glass. 
While all the west in Tyrian splendor flamed. 



By the Seaside, 207 

" But this is life ! " cried Linda, as she put 
Her horse to all his speed, and shook her whip. 
They skimmed the sand, they chased the flying 

wave, 
They walked their horses slow along the beach : 
And, as the light fell on a far-off sail, 
And made it a white glory to the eye. 
Said Linda : " See ! it fades into the gray. 
And now 't is dim, and now is seen no more ! 
Yet would a little height reveal it still. 
So fade from memory scenes which higher points 
Of vision shall reveal : the beautiful. 
The good, shall never die ; and so to-day 
Shall be a lasting, everlasting joy ! " 

" Would I might see more of such days !" said he, 
" In the obscure before me ! Fate forbids. 
My time of idlesse terminates to-night. 
To-morrow to the city we return. 
Thither I go, to open, in October, 



2o8 The Woman who Dared. 

A private school ; and I must find a house 
And make my preparations." 

On they rode, 
After these words, in silence for a mile 
Upon their homeward way. Then Lothian : 
" And what will your address be, in the city 1 " 
" I do not know, nor care," said Linda, switching 
Her horse's ear, to start a quicker trot. 
Another mile of silence ! " Look ! " cried he ; 
" The lighthouse light salutes us ! " — " Yes, I 

see." 
"Why do you go so fast } " — "I '11 slacken speed 
If you desire it. There ! " They breathed their 

horses ; 
Then Lothian : " Indeed, I hope that we 
Shall meet again." — " Why not } The world is 

wide. 
But I have known a letter in a bottle, 
Flung over in mid-ocean, to be found 
And reach its owner. Doubtless, we may meet." 
" I 'm glad to find you confident of that." 



By the Seaside, 209 

Silence again ! And so they rode along 
Till they saw Rachel coming from the house 
To greet them. Charles helped Linda to dis- 
mount. 
Held out his hand, and said, " Good by, Miss 

Linda." 
" Good by ! " she cheerily answered ; " bid your 

father 
Good by for me. And so you go indeed 
To-morrow ?" — " Yes, we may not meet again." 
" Well ; pleasant Journey ! " — " Thank you. 

Good by, Rachel." 
He rode away, leading her panting horse ; 
And, when the trees concealed him, Linda rushed 
Up stairs, and locked the door, and wept awhile. 

As, early the next morning, she looked forth 
On the blue ocean from the open window, 
" Now, then, for work ! " she cried, and drew her 
^ , palm 



2IO The Woman who Dared, 

Across her brow, as if to thrust away 
Thoughts that too perseveringly came back 
She heard a step. 'T is he ! "I hardly hoped, 
Miss Percival, to find you up so early : 
Good by, once more ! " — " Good by ! Don't miss 

the train." 
At this a shadow fell on Lothian's face, 
As with uplifted hat and thwarted smile, 
He turned away. Then off with hasty stride 
He walked and struck the bushes listlessly. 

" What did I mean by speaking so .? " said Linda, 
With hand outstretched, as if to draw him back. 
"Poor fellow! He looked sad; but why— but 

why 
Is he so undemonstrative .? And why 
Could he not ask again for my address, 
I 'd like to know 1 " Poor Linda ! She could 

preach. 
But, like her elders, could not always practise. 



VII. 



FROM LINDA'S DIARY 



T T OME again ! Home ? what satire in the 

word ! 
If home is where the heart is, where 's my home ? 
Well : here 's my easel ; here my old piano ; 
Here the memorials of my early days ! 
Here let me try at least to be content. 
This din of rolling wheels beneath my window, 
Let it renew for me the ocean's roar ! 



212 The Woman who Dared. 

II. 

It is the heart makes music musical ! 
My neighbor has a mocking-bird : its song 
Has been as little heeded as the noise 
Of rattling wheels incessant ; but to-day- 
One of its strains brought all Elysium back 
Into my heart. What was it ? What the tie 
Linking it with some inexpressive joy ? 
At length I solve the mystery ! Those notes, 
Pensively slow and sadly exquisite, 
Were what the wood-thrush piped at early dawn 
After that evening passage in the boat, 
When stars came out, that never more shall set. 
Ok! sweet and clear the measured cadence fell 
Upon my ear in slumber — and I woke ! 
I woke, and listened while the first faint flush 
Of day was in the east ; while yet the grove 
Showed only purple gloom, and on the beach 
The tidal waves with intermittent rush 



if 



From Lindas Diary, 213 

Broke lazily and lent their mingling chime. 
And O the unreckoned riches of the soul I 
The possible beatitudes, of which 
A glimpse is -given, a transitory ghmpse. 
So rarely in a lifetime ! Then it was, 
Hearing that strain, as if all joy the Past 
Had in its keeping, — all the Future held, — 
All love, all adoration, and all beauty, — 
Made for a moment the soul's atmosphere, 
And lifted it to bliss unspeakable. 
O splendor fugitive ! O transport rare ! 
Transfiguring and glorifying life ! 

III. 

This strange, inexplicable human heart ! 

My lawyer sends me more good news ; he writes : 

" The picture's sale will reach ten thousand copies. 

And for the first year only ! We shall have 

A big bill to send in ; and do not fear 

But the ' old man ' will pay it, every dime. 



214 The Woman who Dared, 

To escape the heavy damages the law- 
Allows for such infringement, he '11 be glad 
To compromise for the amount I fix ; 
And what I shall compel him to disgorge 
Will simply be fair copyright on all 
Your published works; and this will give you 

clear 
Some fifteen thousand dollars, not to speak 
Of a fixed interest in future sales." 
So writes jpiy lawyer. Now one would suppose 
That news like this would make me light of 

heart. 
Spur my ambition ; and, as taste of blood 
Fires the pet tiger, even so touch of gold 
Would rouse the sacred appetite of gain. 
But with attainment cometh apathy ; 
And I was somewhat happier, methinks. 
When life was all a struggle, and the prayer, 
" Give me my daily bread," had anxious mean- 
ing. 



From Lindas Diary, 215 

IV. 

Is it then true that woman's proper sphere 

Is in the affections ? that she 's out of place 

When these are balked, and science, art, or trade 

Has won the dedication of her thought ? 

Nay ! the affections are for all ; and he. 

Or she, has most of life, who has them most. 

O, not an attribute of sex are they ! 

Heart loneHness is loneliness indeed, 

But not for woman any more than man, 

Were she so trained, her active faculties 

Could have a worthy aim. 

What worthier. 
Than the pursuit, the discipline of beauty t 
He who finds beauty helps to interpret God : 
For not an irreligious heart can dwell 
In him who sees and knows the beautiful. 
I '11 not believe that one whom Art has chosen 
For a high priest can be irreverent, 
Sordid, unloving ; his veil-piercing eye 



2i6 The Woman who Dared. 

Sees not in life the beauty till it sees 

God and the life beyond ; not in a dream 

Of Pantheistic revery where all 

In all is lost, diluted, and absorbed; 

And consciousness and personality 

Vanish like smoke forever ; but all real, 

Distinct, and individual, though all 

Eternally dependent on the One ! 

Who gave the Eye to see, shall He not see ? 

Who gave the Heart to feel, shall He not love ? 

Of knowledge infinite we know a letter, 

A syllable or two, and thirst for more : 

Is there not One, Teacher at once and Cause, 

Who comprehends all beauty and all science. 

Holding infinity, that, step by step, 

We may advance, and find, in what seems good 

To Him, our gladness and our being's crown ? 

If this were not, then what a toy the world ! 

And what a mockery these suns and systems ! 

And how like pumping at an empty cistern 

Were it to live and study and aspire ! 



From Linda's Diary, 217 

Come, then, O Art ! and warm me with thy smile ! 
Flash on my inward sight thy radiant shapes ! 
August interpreter of thoughts divine, 
Whether in sound, or word, or form revealed! 
Pledge and credential of immortal Hfe ! 
Grand arbiter of truth ! Consoler ! come ! 
Come, help even me to seek thee and to find ! 

V. 

Winter is here again ; it sees me still 
At work upon my picture. This presents 
Two vases, filled with flowers, upon a slab. 
"Which will you choose ?" I call it : 'tis in oil. 
Three hours a day are all I give to it, 
So fine the work, so trying to the eyes. 
Thus have I ample time for teaching Rachel : 
A good child and affectionate ! I've found 
Her aptitude ; she has a taste in bonnets, 
With an inventive skill in ornament. 
And so I have her regularly taught 
10 



2i8 The Woman who Dared. 

By an accomplished milliner ; and Rachel 
Already promises to lead her teacher. 
Had I a fortune, still I 'd have her feel 
That she must conquer something worthily ; 
Something to occupy her active powers, 
And yield a fair support, should need require. 

VI. 

Whom should I meet to-day but Meredith ! 

My washerwoman, Ellen Blount, is ill. 

So ill I fear she never will be well. 

'T is the old story, every day renewed : 

A httle humble, tender-hearted woman. 

Tied to a husband whom to call a brute 

Would be to vilify the quadrupeds ! 

A fellow, who must have his pipe, his whiskey, 

And his good dinner, let what may befall 

His wife and children. He could take the pittance 

She got from her hard toil, and spend it on 

Himself and his companions of the jug. 



From Lindas Diary, 219 

When out of work, as he would often be, 

Then double toil for her ! with peevish words 

From him, the sole requital of it all ! 

Child after child she bore him ; but, compelled 

Too quickly after childbirth to return 

To the old wash-tub, all her sufferings 

Reacted on the children, and they died, 

Haply in infancy the most of them, — 

Until but one was left, — a little boy, 

Puny and pale, gentle and uncomplaining, 

With all the mother staring from his eyes 

In hollow, anxious, pitiful appeal. 

In this one relic all her love and hope 

And all that made her life endurable 

At length were centred. She had saved a dollar 

To buy for him a pair of overshoes ; 

But, as she went to get them, Blount waylaid her. 

Learnt that she had the money, forced it from her. 

Poor Teddy had to go without his shoes. 

'T was when the January thaw had made 



220 The Woman who Dared, 

The streets a-reek with mud and melting snow. 
Poor Teddy wet his feet, took cold, and died. 
" Come soon, mamma," were his last feeble words. 
Blount was a cunning ruffian ; well he knew 
How far to go, and where and when to pause. 
Fluent and specious with his tongue, he kept. 
In his small sphere, a certain show of credit ; 
And he could blow in tune for mother church. 
Though few the pennies he himself would give her. 
" Cast off the wretch," was my advice to Ellen. 
She loved him not ; she might as well have tried 
To love a load that galled and wearied her. 
But custom, social fear, and, above all, 
Those sacramental manacles the church 
Had bound her in, and to the end would keep. 
Forbade the poor, scared, helpless little woman 
To free herself, by one condign resolve. 
From the foul incubus that sucked her life. 
So a false sense of duty kept her tied. 
Feeding in him all that was pitiless. 



From Linda! s Diary, 221 

And now she 's dying. I had gone to-day 
To take some little dainties, cream and fruit, 
And there, administering consolation, 
Was Meredith. 

Hearing his tones of faith. 
Seeing his saintly look of sympathy, 
I felt, there being between us no dissent 
In spirit, dogmas were of small account : 
And so I knelt and listened to his prayer. 
At length he noticed me, and recognized. 
" Miss Percival ! " he cried ; " can this be you ? 
But when and why did you return from England ? " 
" I 've never been in England, never been 
Out of my native country," I replied. 
" But that is unaccountable," said he ; 
" For I Ve seen letters, written as from you. 
Signed with your name, acknowledging receipts 
Of certain sums of money, dated London." 
" No money have I had but what I 've earned," 
Was my reply ; " and who should send me money ^ " 



222 The Woman who Dared, 

Said he : "I have a carriage at the door ; 
I would learn more of this ; you '11 not object 
To take a seat with me ? Thank you ; that *s 
right." 

Leaving the patient in good hands, we went, 
And through the noisy streets drove to the Park. 
Then all I 'd ever known about my parents 
He drew from me ; and all my history 
Since I had parted from him ; noted down 
Carefully my address, and gave me his. 
Then to my lodgings driving with me back, 
He left me with a Benedicite ! 
He 's rich : has he been sending money, then "i 
What means it all } Conjecture finds no clew. 

VII. 

Gently as thistle-downs are borne away 
From the dry stem, went Ellen yesterday. 
I heard her dying utterance ; it was : 



From Lindas Diary, 223 

"I'm coming, Teddy ! Bless you, dear Miss Linda!" 
No priest was by, so sudden was her going. 
When Blount came in, there was no tenderness 
In his sleek, gluttonous look ; although he tried, 
Behind his handkerchief, to play the mourner. 
What will he do without a drudge to tread on ? 
Counting himself a privileged lord and master, 
He '11 condescend to a new victim soon. 
And make some patient waiter a sad loser. 

viir. 

" Some patient waiter ! " Such a one I know. 

There was a time when I resolved, if ever 

I could secure a modest competence, 

I would be married ; and the competence 

Is now secure — but where is my resolve } 

Shall I conclude 't is all fatality ? 

Leave it to chance, and take no active step 

Myself to seek what I so hope to find ? 

Accepting it as heaven's fixed ordinance. 



224 The Woman who Dared. 

That man should change his single lot at will, 

But woman be the sport of circumstance, 

A purposeless and passive accident. 

Inert as oysters waiting for a tide, 

But not like oysters, sure of what they wait for ? 

" Ah ! woman's strength is in passivity," 

Fastidio says, shaking his wise, wise head. 

And withering me with a disdainful stare. 

Nay ! woman's strength is in developing, 

In virtuous ways, all that is best in her. 

No superstitious waiting then be mine ! 

No fancy that in coy, alluring arts. 

Rather than action, modest and sincere, 

Woman most worthily performs her part. 

Here am I twenty-five, and all alone 

In the wide world ; yet having won the right, 

By my own effort, to hew out my lot. 

And create ties to cheer this arid waste. 

How bleak and void my Future, if I stand 

Waiting beside the stream, until some Prince — 



From Lindas Diary, 225 

Son of Queen Moonbeam by King Will-o'-the 

wisp — 
Appears, and jumping from his gilded boat, 
Lays heart and fortune at my idle feet ! 
Ye languid day-dreams, vanish ! let me act ! 

But ah ! Fastidio says, " A woman's wooing 
Must always be offensive to a man 
Of any dignity." The dignity 
That modest truth can shock is far too frail 
And sensitive to mate with love of mine. 
Whose earnestness might crush the feeble hand 
Linked in its own. So good by, dignity ! 
I shall survive the chill of your repulse. 
Defiance, not of Nature's law, but Custom's, 
Is what disturbs Fastidio. Does he think 
That a maiis wooing never is offensive 
To woman s dignity .'' In either sex 
The disaffection is not prompted by 
The wooing but the wooer ; love can never 
10* o 



226 The Woman who Dared. 

Be an unwelcome tribute to the lover ; 
Though freedom premature, or forwardness 
Unwarranted, may rightly fail to win. 
And so I '11 run my risk ; for I confess — 
(Keep the unuttered secret, sacred leaf!) — 
That there is one whom I could love — could die 

for, 
Would he but — Tears ? Well, tears may come 

from strength 
As well as weakness : I '11 not grudge him these ; 
I '11 not despair while I can shed a tear. 

IX. 

I 've found him — seen him ! The Directory 
Gave me his residence. He keeps a school, 
One for young ladies only ; and at once 
My coward heart hit on a good excuse 
For calling on him : Would he take a pupil .? 
Rache], my protegee ? Of course he would. 
A flush of tender, joyful wonderment, 



From Lindas Diary, 227 

Methonght, illumed his face at seeing me ; 

Then, as it faded, I was grieved to mark 

How pale and thin and worn with care he 

looked. 
I took my leave, promising to return 
Within a week ; and on the outer steps 
I met his father. " Turn and walk with me 
A square or two," said I ; and he complied. 
" What ails him ? " I inquired. " Only hard 

work : 
He puts too much of conscience into it. 
Needs help, but shrinks from debt, and so keeps 

on 
Doing the labor two or three should share. 
What shall I do. Miss Percival, to stop it .? " 
" I know not, — only something must be done, 
And that at once," said I, in tones which made 
The old man turn to get a look at me. 

I hailed an omnibus, and there we parted 

What if I write Charles Lothian a letter } 



228 The Woman who Dared, 

Nay, I '11 not skulk behind a sheet of paper, 
But face to face say what I have to say. 
This very evening must I call again. 
Let a firm will bear up my fainting heart ! 

X. 

And so at eight o'clock the carriage came, 

And entering it I drove to Lothian's. 

At last I was alone with him once more ! 

He had been sitting at a table heaped 

With manuscripts, and these he was correcting. 

" I 'm here to interrupt all this," said I ; 

"Too long you 've kept your brain upon the 

stretch : 
Why be so heedless of your health, your life } " 
" But what are they to you. Miss Percival } " 
"And that is what I 've come to let you know," 
Said I, emboldened by the offered foothold. 
He flushed a little, only just a little, — 
Replying, " That I 'm curious to learn." 



From Lindas Diary, 229 

And then, like one who, in the dark, at first 

Moves cautiously, but soon runs boldly on, 

'I said : " Rash gambler that I am, I 've come 

To put upon the hazard of a die 

Much of my present and my future peace ; 

Perhaps to shock, repel, and anger you. 

Since 't will not be unwarned that I offend. 

I know you guess my purpose, and you shrink 

From hearing me avow it ; but I will, 

And that in homely English unadorned. 

I 'm here to offer you my hand ; the heart 

That should go with it has preceded it, 

And dwells with you, so you can claim your own, 

Or gently bid it go, to trouble you 

Never again. If 't is unwomanly 

This to avow, then I 'm unlike my sex, 

Not false to my own nature, — ah ! not false. 

I must be true or die ; I cannot play 

A masker's part, disguising hopes that cling 

Nearest my brooding heart. But, say the word, 



230 The Woman who Dared, 

' I cannot love you/ and the bird who leaves 
The cage where he has pined will sooner try 
To enter it again, than I return 
To utter plaint of mine within your hearing " 

With throbbing heart and burning face I ceased. 
Twice, thrice he tried to stop me ; but my words 
Came all too quick and earnestly for that. 
And then resigned he listened. I had seen. 
Or dreamed I had, at first a sacred joy 
At my avowal sparkle in his eyes. 
And then an utter sadness follow it, 
Which chilled me, and I knew that I had failed. 

" O divine Pity ! what will you not brave t " 
He answered, and the dew was in his eyes, — 
"You bring her here, even to abase herself 
To rescue me ! Too costly sacrifice ! 
Here do not dwell the Graces and the Loves, 
But Drudgery is master of the house. 



/i 



From Lindas Diary, 231 

Dear lady, elsewhere seek the answering bloom." 
A hope flashed up. " Do you suppose/' said I, 
" That any impulse less supreme than love — 
Love bold to venture, but intemerate — 
Could bring me here — that Pity could do this .'' " 

" I believe all," he answered, " all you say ; 
But do not bid me whisper more than this : 
The circumstances that environ me, 
And which none know, — not even my father 

knows, — 
Shut me out utterly from any hope 
Of marriage or of love. A wretch in prison 
Might better dream of marrying than I. 
But O sweet lady ! rashly generous, — 
Around whom, a protecting atmosphere, 
Floats Purity, and sends her messengers 
With flaming swords to guard each avenue 
From thoughts unholy and approaches base, — 
Thou who hast made an act I deemed uncomely 



232 The Woman who Dared. 

Seem beautiful and gracious, — do not doubt 
My memory of thy worth shall be the same, 
Only expanded, lifted up, and touched 
With light as dear as sunset radiance 
To summer trees after a thunder-storm." 

And there was silence then between us two. 
Thought of myself was lost in thought for him. 
What was my wreck of joy, compared with his ? 
Health, youth, and competence were mine, and 

he 
Was staking all of his to save another. 
If my winged hopes fell fluttering to the ground, 
Regrets and disappointments were forgotten 
In the reflection, He, then, is unhappy ! 
" Good by ! " at length I said, giving my hand : 
" Even as I was believed, will I believe. 
You do not deal in hollow compliment ; 
And we shall meet again if you 're content. 
The good time will return — and I '11 return ! " 



From Linda's Diary, 233 

" If you return, the good time will return 
And stay as long as you remain," said he. 

XI. 

It is as I supposed : an obstacle 

Which his assumption of his father's debts 

Has raised before him unexpectedly ! 

I did not let a day go by before 

I saw the elder Lothian, and he, 

Distressed by what I told him of a secret, 

Applied himself to hunting up a key 

To the mysterious grief: at last he got it. 

Though not by means that I could justify. 

In Charles's private escritoire he found 

A memorandum that explained it all. 

Among the obligations overlooked, 

In settling up the firm's accounts, was one 

Of fifty thousand dollars, payable 

To an estate, the representatives 

Of which were six small children and a widow, 



234 The Woman who Dared, 

Dependent now on what they could derive 
Of income from this debt ; and manfully 
Charles shoulders it, although it crushes him ; 
And hopes to keep his father ignorant. 
I can command one quarter of the sum 
Already — but the rest ? That staggers me. 
And yet why should I falter ? Look at him ! 
Let his example be my high incentive. 
I '11 be his helpmate, and he shall not know it. 
Poor Charles ! I '11 toil for him, — to him devote 
All that I have of energy and skill, 
All I acquire. Ambition shall not mount 
Less loftily for having Love to help it. 
Come forth, my easel ! All thy work has been 
Girl's play till now ; now will I truly venture. 
I 've a new object now — to rescue him ! 
And he shall never know his rescuer 
From lips of mine, — no, though I die for it. 
With the sweet secret undisclosed, — my heart 
Glad in the love he never may requite ! 



VIII. 

FROM MEREDITH'S DIARY. 



T NCALCULABLY selfish and corrupt, 
Well may man need a sacrifice divine 
To expiate infinity of sin. 
Few but a priest can know the fearful depth 
Of human wickedness. At times I shrink 
Faint and amazed at what I have to learn : 
And then I wonder that the Saviour said 
His yoke is easy and his burden light. 
Ah ! how these very murmurs at my lot 



/ 



ly 



236 The Woman who Dared, 

Show that not yet into my heart has crept 
That peace of God which passeth understanding ! 

II. 

Among my hearers lately there has been 

A lady all attention to my words : 

Thrice have I seen that she was deeply moved ; 

And to confession yesterday she came. 

Let me here call her Harriet. She is 

By education Protestant, but wavers, 

Feeling the ground beneath her insecure, 

And would be led unto the rock that is 

Higher than she. A valuable convert ; 

Not young ; in feeble health ; taxed for two 

millions ; 
And she would found, out of her ample means, 
A home for orphans and neglected children. 
Heaven give me power to lead the stray one safe 
Into the only fold ; securing thus 
Aid for the church, salvation for herself ! 



From Meredith's Diary. 237 

III. 
A summons took me to her house to-day. 
Her mother and her step-father compose 
With Harriet the household. I refrain 
From putting real names on paper here. 
Let me then call the man's name, Denison ; 
He 's somewhat younger than his wife, a lady 
Advanced in years, but her heart wholly set 
On the frivolities of fashion still. 
I see the situation at a glance : 
A mercenary marriage on the part 
Of Denison, whose hungry eyes are fixed 
Upon the daughter's property ; the mother 
Under his evil influence, and expecting 
The daughter to die soon, without a will, 
Thus leaving all to them ; — and Harriet 
Not quite so dull but she can penetrate 
Denison's motive and her mother's hope! 
A sad state for an invalid who feels 
That any hour may be her last ! To-day 



238 The Woman who Dared, 

Harriet confessed ; for she has been alarmed 
By some bad symptoms lately. As she urged it, 
I sent word to the bishop, and he came, 
And she was formally confirmed, and taken 
Unto the bosom of the Church, and there 
May her poor toiling spirit find repose ! 

IV. 

Another summons ! In the drawing-room, 
Whom should I meet but Denison ? His stare 
Had something vicious in it ; but we bowed. 
And he remarked : " I hear that Harriet, 
Caught in your Catholic net, is turning saint. 
No foul play, priest ! She 's not in a condition 
To make a will, or give away her money. 
Remember that, and do not waste your words." 
My color rose, and the brute Adam in me 
Would, uncontrolled, have surely knocked him 

down. 
But I cast off temptation, and replied : 



Front Meredith's Diary. 239 

" Sir, I 'm responsible to God, not man." 

I left him, and passed on to Harriet. 

I found her greatly moved ; an interview 

She had been having with her mother caused 

The agitation. " Take me hence ! " she cried ; 

" I '11 not remain another day or hour 

Under this roof.. I tell you, I m not safe 

With these two, watching, dogging, maddening 

me." 
She rang the bell, and to the servant said : 
" My carriage, and that quickly ! " Then to me : 
" I '11 show them that I 'm mistress of my fortune 
And of myself. Call on me in an hour 
At the Fifth Avenue Hotel, for there 
Henceforth I make my home." And there 
I called, as she had ordered, and w^e met 
In her own parlor. " What I wish," said she, 
" Is to give all I have, without reserve. 
For the foundation that I 've planned. I '11 

send 



24P The Woman who Dared, 

Directions to my lawyer, and the papers 

Shall be prepared at once." — " Before you do it, 

Let me learn more of you and yours," said I : 

" Who was your father ? " Then, to my surprise, 

I learnt that he was one whom I had met 

Some years before, — in his death-hour had met. 

" But you Ve a sister ? " suddenly I asked. 

Surprised, she answered : " A half-sister — yes — 

I Ve seen her only once ; for many years 

I lived in Europe ; she 's in England now, 

And married happily. On three occasions 

I 've sent her money." — " Do you correspond } " 

" Not often ; here are letters from her, full 

Of thanks for all I 've given her." — *' In your 

will 
Shall you remember her ? " — " If you advise it." 
" Then I advise a liberal bequest. 
And now I must attend a sufferer 
Who waits my help." — "Father, I would con- 
fess." 



From Meredith's Diary, 241 

" Daughter, be quick : I listen." * Harriet 

Then gave a sad recital of a trial 

And a divorce ; and (but reluctantly) 

Told of a terrible suspicion, born 

Of a remark, dropped by a servant once. 

Concerning her unlikeness to her father : 

But never could she wring a confirmation 

Of the distressing story from her mother. 

*' Tell her," said I, " you mean to leave your sister 

A handsome legacy." She promised this. 

Then saying I would call the following day, 

I hurried off to see poor Ellen Blount. 

V. 

A new surprise ! There, by the patient's bed, 
I came on Linda, Harriet's half-sister ! 
(Reputed so, at least, but here 's a doubt.) 
I questioned her, and now am satisfied 
Treason and forgery have been at work. 
Defeating Harriet's sisterly intent ; 



242 The Woman who Dared, 

Moreover, that the harrowing surmise, 
Waked by a servant's gossip overheard, 
Is, in all probability, the truth ! 
And, if we so accept it, what can I 
Advise but Harriet's complete surrender 
Of all her fortune to the real child 
And proper heir of Albert Percival ? 
But ah ! 't is now devoted to the Church ! 
Here 's a divided duty ; I must lay 
The case before a higher power than mine. 

VI. 

I Ve had a long discussion with the bishop. 
I placed before him all the facts, beginning 
With those of my own presence at the death 
Of Linda's parents ; of her father's letter 
Received that day, communicating news 
Of Kenrick's large bequest ; the father's effort 
In dying to convey in legal form 
To his child Linda all this property ; 



( 



From Merediths Diary. 243 

The failure of the effort ; his decease, 

And all I knew of subsequent events. 

And the good bishop, after careful thought, 

Replied : "Some way the mother must be brought 

To full confession. Of her guilt no doubt ! " 

I told him I had charged it on the daughter 

To tell her mother of the legacy 

Designed for Linda ; this, perchance, might wring 

Confession from the guilty one. He seemed 

To think it not unlikely, and remarked : 

" When that is got, there 's but a single course 

For you to urge on Harriet ; for, my son, 

I need not tell a Christian gentleman. 

Not to say priest, that this peculiar case 

We must decide precisely as we would 

If the Church had in it no interest : 

Let Harriet at once give up, convey, 

Not bequeath merely, all she has to Linda. 

Till she does this, her soul will be in peril ; 

When she does this, she shall be made the ward 



244 The Woman who Dared, 

Of Holy Church, and cared for to the end." 
I kissed his hand and left. How his high thoughts 
Poured round my path a flood of light divine ! 
Why did I hesitate, since he could make 
The path of duty so directly clear ! 

VII. 

Harriet's intimation to her mother 

That she should leave a good part of her v^realth 

To her half-sister brought things to a crisis. 

To-day my visit found the two together : 

Harriet, in an agony of tears, 

Cried to me, as I entered, — " 'T is all trUe ! 

God ! She confesses it — confesses it ! 

Confesses, too, she never sent the money, 

And that the letters were all forgeries ! 

And thinks, by this confession, to secure 

My fortune to herself! Ah ! Can this woman 

Be, then, my mother ? " 

Hereupon the woman. 



From Meredith's Diary, 245 

Crimson with rage at being thus exposed, 
Exclaimed, "Unnatural daughter — " But be- 
fore 
Her wrath could vent itself, she, with a groan. 
Fell in convulsions. Medical assistance 
Was had at once. Then Denison came in, 
Aghast at what had happened ; for he knew 
His wife's estate was all in lands and houses, 
And would, if she should die, be Harriet's, 
Since the old lady superstitiously 
Had still put off the making of a will. 
All help was vain, and drugs were powerless. 
Paralysis had struck the heated brain, 
Driving from mortal hold the consciousness : 
It reappeared not in one outward sign. 
And before midnight life had left the clay. 

VIII. 

Meek and submissive as a little child 
Is Harriet now ; she has no will but that 



246 The Woman who Dared, 

The Church imposes as the will divine. 

" Your fortune, nearly doubled by this death, 

Must all," said I, " be now conveyed to Linda." 

" Let it be done," she cried, " before I sleep ! " 

And it was done to-night — securely done, — 

I being Linda's representative. 

To-morrow I must take her the good news. 

IX. 

After the storm, the rainbow, child of light ! 
Such the transition, as I pass to Linda ! 
I found her hard at work upon a picture. 
With wonder at Heaven's ways she heard my 

news. 
Shocked at the tragic death, she did not hide 
Her satisfaction at the tardy act 
Bringing the restitution of her own. 
Three things she asked ; one was that I would 

place 
At once a certain person in possession 



From Meredith's Diary. 247 

Of a large sum, not letting him find out 
From whom it came ; another was to have 
This great change in her fortunes kept a secret 
As long as she might wish ; the third and last 
Was that she might be privileged to wait 
On Harriet with a sister's loving care. 
All which I promised readily should be, 
So far as my poor human will could order. 
Said Linda then : " Tell Harriet, her scheme 
For others' welfare shall not wholly fail ; 
That in your hands I '11 place a sum sufficient 
To plant the germ at least of what she planned." 

X. 

I Ve taken my last look of Harriet : 

She died in Linda's arms, and comforted 

With all the Church could give of heavenly hope. 

Slowly and imperceptibly does Time 

Work out the dreadful problem of our sins ! 

Not often do we see it solved as here 



248 The Woman who Dared. 

In plain results which he who runs may read. 
Not always is the sinner's punishment 
Shown in this world. May the Eternal Mercy 
Cleanse us from secret faults, nor, while we mark 
Another's foulness, blind us to our own ! 



IX. 



BESIDE THE LAKE. 

'npHE sun of August from a clear blue sky 

Shone on Lake Saranac. The South-wind 
stirred 
Mildly the woods encircling, that threw down 
A purple shadow on the liquid smoothness 
Glassing the eastern border, while the west 
Lay bared to light. 

Wild, virgin nature all ! 
Except that here and there a partial clearing, 
II* 



250 The Woman who Dared, 

Made by the sportsman's axe for summer tents, 
Dented the massive verdure, and revealed 
A Httle slope of bank, dotted with stumps 
And brown with slender aromatic leaves 
Shed from' the pine, the hemlock, and the fir 
In layers that gave a soft and slippery carpet. 

Near one of these small openings where the 

breeze 
Crept resinous and cool from evergreens 
Behind them, while the sun blazed bright be- 
fore, — 
Where with the pine-trees' vapory depth of hue 
The whiteness of a spacious tent contrasted. 
Beside which, on a staff, the nation's flag 
Flung out its crimson with protecting pride, — 
Reclined a wife and husband, looking down 
Less on the glorious lake than on the glory 
That, through a gauzy veil, played round the 
head 



i 



Beside the Lake, 2^1 

Of a reposing infant, golden-tressed, 

Asleep upon a deer-skin at their feet, 

While a huge dog kept watchful guard beyond : 

For there lay little Mary Merivale. 

Boats on the lake showed that this group de- 
tached 

Were part of a well-chosen company. 

Here children ran and frolicked on the beach ; 

There an old man, rowed by two guides, stood 
up 

With rod and line and reel, while swiftly flew 

The reel, announcing that a vigorous trout 

Just then had seized the hook. Came the loud 
cry,— 

" Look, Charles ! Look, Linda ! See me land 
him now ! 

Don't touch him with your scoop, men ! I can 
fetch him," — 

In tones not unfamiliar to our ears. 



252 The Woman who Dared. 

And there, six boats swept by, from which the 

voices 
Of merry children and their elder friends - 
Mothers and fathers, teachers, faded aunts, 
Dyspeptic uncles, wonderfully cured 
All by this tonic, Adirondack air — 
Came musical and loud : a strange collection. 
Winnowed by Rachel (now the important queen 
Of all this sanitary revelry) 
From her acquaintance in the public schools ; 
Whence her quick sympathies had carried her 
Straight to the overworked, the poor, the ailing, 
Among the famiUes of her associates, 
When Linda planned this happy enterprise 
Of a grand camping-out for one whole month. 
The blind aunt and the grandmother, of course. 
High and important persons, Rachel's aids, 
Graced the occasion ; for the ancient dame 
Had lived in such a region in her youth. 
And in all sylvan craft was proudly wise : 



\ 



Beside the Lake, 2^1 

Declaring that this taste of life would add 
Some ten years to her eighty-five, at least. 

On went the boats, all large and safely manned, 
In competition not too venturesome. 
Then, from a rocky outlook on the hill. 
There came a gush of music from a band. 
Employed to cheer with timely melody 
This strange encampment in the wilderness. 
Hark ! Every voice is hushed as down the lake 
The breathing clarions accordant send 
The tune of " Love Not " to each eager ear ! 
The very infant, in its slumber, smiled 
As if a dream of some old paradise 
Had been awakened by the ravishment. 

" Look at the child ! " cried Linda ; " mark that 

smile ! 
All heaven reflected in a dew-drop ! See ! " 
" And all the world grasped in that little fist, — 



254 The Woman who Dared. 

At least as we esteem the world ! " cried Charles. 

"And yet," said Linda, " 't is a glorious world : 

See how those families enjoy themselves ! " 

" And who created all this happiness ? " 

The husband said, — "who, after God, but Linda? 

Who spends her money, not in rearing piles 

Of cold and costly marble for her pride, — 

Not in great banquets for the rich and gay 

Who need them not, and laugh at those who 

give, — 
Where, at one feast, enough is spent to make 
All these poor people radiant for a month, — 
But in exhilarations coming from 
Communicated joy and health and life, — 
The happiness that 's found in making happy." 

"All selfishness !" cried Linda ; '' selfishness ! 
I seek my happiness, and others theirs ; 
Only my tastes are different ; more plebeian, 
Haply, they 'd say ; but, husband mine, reflect ! 



Beside the Lake. 255 

You, too, I fear, are lacking in refinement : 
Would this have been, had you not acquiesced 
In all these vulgar freaks, and found content, 
Like me, in giving pleasure to the needy ? 
And tell me — passing to another point — 
Where would have been the monarch of this joy, 
That little child, — that antepast of bliss 
Such as the angels taste, — had I recoiled 
From daring as I did, even when I knew 
He I most wished to win would think me bold ? " 

" Ah ! little wife," cried Charles, " I Ve half a 

mind 
To tell you what I Ve never told you yet . 
Yes, I will tell you all, although it may 
End the complacent thought that Linda did it — 
Did it by simply daring to propose ! 
Know, then, a constant track of you I kept. 
Even while I seemed to shun you. I could kneel 
Before your recollection in my heart, 



256 The Woman who Dared. 

When you regarded me as shy and cold. 
And, while by poverty held reticent, - 
I saw, supreme among my hopes, but Linda ! 
Before we left the sea-side I had learnt. 
Through gossip of my worthy landlady, 
Where you would go, returning to New York. 
I found your house ; I passed it more than once 
When, like a beacon, shone your study-lamp. 
The very night before you called upon me 
To ask, would I take Rachel as my pupil, 
(How kind in you to patronize my school ! ) 
I sought an anodyne for my despair 
In watching for your shadow on the curtain. 

" Discovery of that unexpected debt, 
Owed by my father, killed the last faint hope 
Which I had cherished ; and our interview — 
Your daring offer of this little hand — • 
But made me emulous to equal you 
In self-renouncing generosity ; 



Beside the Lake, 257 

And so, I frankly told you what I told : 
That love and marriage were not in my lot. 

" Ten days elapsed, and then from utter gloom 
I sprang to cheerful^ Hght. My father's partner. 
The man named Judd, who robbed us all one day. 
Had a compunctious interval, and sent 
A hundred thousand dollars back to us — 
Why do you smile ? " 

" Go on. 'T is worth a smile." 

" That very day I cleared myself from debt ; 
That very day I sued for Linda's hand ; 
That very day she gave it willingly ; 
And the next month beheld us two made one. 
And so it would have been, if you, my dear. 
Had made no sign, and waited patiently. 
But ah ! what luck was mine ! After two days. 
The news arrived that Linda was an heiress. 
An heiress ! Think of it ; and I had said, 

<2 



258 The Woman who Dared, 

Never, no, never would I wed an heiress ! 

But 't was too late for scruples ; I was married, — 

Caught in the trap I always meant to shun ! " 

Then Linda, mischief in her smile, exclaimed : 
" O simple Charles ! The innocent dear man ! 
Who doubts but woman ought to hold her 

tongue, 
And wait till he, the preordained, appear ? 
That hundred thousand dollars, you are sure. 
Was from your father's partner — was from Judd?" 

"Of course it was, — from Judd, and no one else ! 
Who could have sent the money, if not Judd ? 
No doubt it came from Judd ! My father said, 
'T was conscience-money, and restored by Judd, 
Who had become a deacon in the Church. 
Why did you ask me whether I was sure 
The hundred thousand dollars came from Judd ? 
What are you smihng at, provoking Linda ? " 



Beside the Lake. 259 

" O, you 're so quick, so clever, all you men ! 

And women are so dull and credulous, 

So easily duped, when left to go alone ! 

What you would prove is, that my daring step. 

In being first to make a declaration, 

Was needless, since priority in love 

Was yours, and your intention would have brought 

The same result about without my seeking. 

Know then, the money was not yours until 

I 'd got the news of my recovered fortune ; 

From me the money came, and only me ; 

And all that story of a Judd, turned deacon. 

Grown penitent and making restitution, 

Was a mere myth, invented by your father, 

Lest you might hesitate to take the money. 

Now if I had not sought you as I did. 

And if I had not put you to the test, 

And if I had not learnt your secret grief. 

We might have lived till we were gray and bent 

Before a step of yours had brought us nearer." 



26o The Woman who Dared. 

" Outflanked ! I own it, and I give it up ! " 
Cried Charles, all flushing with astonishment : 
" But how I '11 rate that ancient fisherman, 
My graceless father, for deceiving me ! 
See him stand there, as if with conscience void, 
Throwing the line for innocent, fat trout ! 
With that grave face, saying the money came 
From Judd, — from Deacon Judd ! I '11 deacon 
him ! " 

" What ! you regret it, do you. Master Charles ? 
The crooked ways that brought you where you are 
You would make straight, and have the past un- 
done ? 
To think that by a woman you 've been wooed. 
To think that by a woman you 've been won. 
Is thought too humbling and too scandalous ; 
Is an indignity too hard to bear ! 
Oh ! well, sir, well ; do as you please ; the child 
Goes with its mother, though ; remember that." 



Beside the Lake. 261 

And here the infant threw its eyelids back, 

ReveaUng orbs, blue as the shadows cast 

On Saranac's blue by overhanging woods. 

Said Lothian, snatching up the smiling wonder, 

And handing it, with kisses, to the mother : 

" Take all your woman's rights ; even this, the 

best : 
Are we not each the richer by the sharing 
Of such a gift ? I '11 not regret your daring." 



NOTES 



Page ii. 
*^0h ! lacking love and best experience.^'' 
An extreme Materialism here comes to the support of a 
grim theology. In his " Physiology and Pathology of the Mind," 
Dr. Maudsley says: "To talk about the purity and innocence 
of a child's mind is a part of that poetical idealism and willing 
hypocrisy by which man ignores realities and delights to walk 
in a vain show." Such sweeping generalizations do not inspire 
confidence in the writer's prudence. Christ was nearer the truth 
when he said, concerning little children, — "Of such is the 
kingdom of heaven. " 

Page 64. 

** Few hojtorable outlooks for support. 
Excepting marriage.''' 

Referring to the fact that in Massachusetts, during the ten 
years from 1859 to 1869, the increase of crime among women has 
been much greater than among men, Miss Catherine Beecher re- 
marks : " But turning from these (the criminal class) to the daugh- 
ters of the most wealthy class, those who have generous and 
devoted aspirations also feel that for them, too, there is no open- 
ing, no promotion, no career, except that of marriage, — and for 
this they arc trained to feel that it is disgraceficl to seek. They have 
nothing to do but wait to be sought. Trained to believe marriage 
their highest boon, they are disgraced for seeking it, and 77iust affect 
indifference. 

" Meantime to do anything to earn their own independence is 
what father and brothers would deem a disgrace to themselves 



264 The Woman who Dared, 

and their family. For women of high position to work for their 
livelihood, in most cases custom decrees as disgraceful. And 
then, if cast down by poverty, they have been trained to nothing 
that would earn a support, or, if by chance they have some 
resource, all avenues for its employment are thronged with needy 
applicants." 

This is but a very mild statement of the social fictions under 
which woman is now suffering in mind, body, and estate ; but it 
is valuable as coming from a witness who hopes that some less 
radical remedy than female suff"rage will be found for existing 
evils. If the remedy lies with woman herself, as all admit, how 
can we expect her to act efficiently until she is a modifying force 
in legislation ? 

Page 65. 
" Unions^ no priest, no church can sanctify J'' 

" The most absurd notions," says J. A. St. John, " have pre- 
vailed on the. subject of matrimony. Marriage, it is said, is a 
divine institution, therefore marriages are made in heaven ; but 
the consequence does not at all follow ; the meaning of the for- 
mer proposition simply being that God originally ordained that 
men and women should be united in wedlock ; but that he de- 
termined what particular men and women should be united, 
every day's experience proves to be false. It is admitted on all 
hands that marriage is intended to confer happiness on those 
who wed. Now, if it be found that marriage does not confer 
happiness on them, it is an undoubted proof that they ought not 
to have been united, and that the sooner they separate the better ; 
but from accepting this doctrine some persons are deterred by 
misrepresentations of scripture, others by views of policy, and 
others again by an entire indiff-erence to human happiness. They 
regard men and women as mere animals, and, provided they have 
children, and rear them, nothing more." 

" It is incredible," says Milton, " how cold, how dull, and ^ar 
from all fellow-feeling we are, without the spur of self-concern- 
ment ! " 



Notes, 265 

Page 72. 
" Behold the world's ideal of a wife ! " 

*' All women," says John Stuart Mill, *' are brought up from 
their very earliest years in the belief that their ideal character is 
the very opposite to that of man ; not self-will and self-govern- 
ment by self-control, but submission and yielding to the control 

°^ °*^^^^ What is now called the nature of women is an 

emmently artificial thing, -the result of forced repression in 
some directions, unnatural stimulation in others." 

The cowardice that is looked upon as disgraceful in a man is 
regarded by many as rather honorable than otherwise in a woman 
False notions, inherited from chivalrous times, and growing out 
of the state of subjection in which woman has been bred, have 
generated this inconsistency. The truth is that courage is hon- 
orable to both sexes; to a Grace Darling and an Ida Lewis, 
a Madame Roland and a Florence Nightingale, as well as to a 
Bayard and a Shaw, a Napoleon and a Farragut. 

Page 73. 

" That moment should the intimate relations 
Of marriage end, and a release be found! " 
In the United States the action of certain State legislatures, in 
increasing the facilities for divorce, has been a subject of alarm 
among persons bred under the influences of a more conservative 
system. It would be difficult to show as yet whether social mo- 
rality is harmed or helped by the increased freedom. Nothing 
can be more deceptive and unsatisfactory than the statistics of- 
fered on both sides of the question. It is generally admitted, we 
believe, that in those countries where divorce is most difficult, the 
number of illegitimate births is largest, and the reputation of 
married women is most questionable. In the nature of things, 
much of the prevalent immorality being furtive and clandestine, 
it is impossible to estimate the extent of the evils growing out of 
illiberal laws in relation to matrimony. In any legislation on the 
subject women should have a voice. 
12 



266 The Woman who Dared. 

Page 8o. 

" Unlike the Chwrh, I look on marriage as 
A civil contract, not a sacramentJ" 
Kenrick here refers of course to the Catholic Church, whose 
theory of marriage, namely, that it is a sacrament and indissolu- 
ble, when once contracted according to the forms of the Church, 
still influences the legislation and social prejudices of Protestant 
communities in respect to their own religious forms of marriage. 
It was not till the twelfth century, and under the auspices of 
Pope Innocent III., that divorce was prohibited by the civil as 
well as the canon law. But it is only a marriage between Cath- 
olics that is indissoluble under the Catholic system. In the case 
of a marriage of Protestants, the tie is not regarded as binding. 
A dissolution was actually granted in such a case where one of 
the parties turned Catholic, in 1857, by the bishop of Rio Janeiro, 
who pronounced an uncanonical marriage null and void. Mod- 
ern legislation in establisliing the validity of civil marriages aimed 
a severe blow at ecclesiastical privilege. 

To Rome and not to the Bible we must go for all the authority 
we can produce for denying that marriage is simply a civil con- 
tract. The form, binding one man to one woman, had its origin 
outside of the Bible. Up to the time of Charlemagne in the 
eighth century, polygamy and concubinage were common among 
Christians and countenanced by the Church. Even Luther 
seems to have had somewhat lax, though not unscriptural, no- 
tions on the subject. When Philip, landgrave of Hesse-Cassel, 
wanted to take another wife, and threatened to get a dispensation 
from the Pope for the purpose, Luther convoked a synod, com- 
posed of six of his proselytes, who declared that marriage 
is merely a civil contract ; that they could find no passage in 
the Holy Scriptures ordaining monogamy; and they conse- 
quently signed a decree permitting Philip to take a second wife 
without repudiating his first. 

In that reconstruction of laws, threatened by the movement in 
behalf of female suffrage, it is not probable that the patriarchal 



Notes, 267 

institution of polygamy will be regarded otherwise than as debas- 
ing to both sexes ; but perhaps a greater latitude of divorce will 
be sought as not inconsistent with pubHc morality. Looking at 
the question abstractly, and apart from all religious and social 
prejudice, it certainly seems the height of cruelty and absurdity to 
compel parties to keep up the relations of man and wife when one 
of them feels towards the other either a physical repugnance or 
a moral dislike. The impediments often raised by our courts in 
the way of divorce are gross relics of barbarism, and will be 
abolished by a higher legislative morality. 

" Whoso," says Milton, " prefers either matrimony or other 
ordinance before the good of man and the plain exigence of 
charity, let him profess Papist or Protestant or what he will, he 
is no better than a pharisee, and understands not the gospel ; 
whom, as a misinterpreter of Christ, I openly protest against." 
And, in another passage, he rebukes those who would rest '* in 
the mere element of the text," as favoring " the policy of the 
Devil to make that gracious ordinance (of marriage) become 
insupportable, that what with men not daring to venture upon 
wedlock, and what with men wearied out of it, all inordinate 
license might abound." 

Mr. J. A. St. John, editor of the Prose Works of Milton, remarks 
in reference to the marriage law as it now stands in England : — 

*' Having been invented and established by men, it is calculated 
to bear with extreme severity on women, who are daily subjected 
to wrongs and hardships which they would not endure, were 
the relief of divorce open to them. Those who take a different 
view descant upon the encouragement which would, they say, 
be given to immorality were divorce made easy. But the con- 
trary is the truth. 

" It is in behalf of morals, and for the sake of imparting a 
higher tone to the feelings of society, that the present unnatural 
system should be abolished. Where, what Milton calls, an un- 
conjugal mind exists, there must be unconjugal manners ; and to 
what these lead no one need be told. Where marriage is indis- 
soluble, people presume upon that fact to transgress its laws, 



268 The Woman who Dared. 

which they would not do were it legally practicable to obtain 
immediate redress. 

" However, there is a great indisposition in mankind to inno- 
vate in legislation ; and they had generally rather be miserable 

according to rule than free and happy on a novel principle 

Whenever it clearly appears that man and wife can no longer 
live together in peace and harmony, their separation would be far 
more beneficial to themselves and favorable to morals, than their 
compulsory union. Milton's notions of married life are highly 
flattering to women, whom he evidently contemplates as the 
equal companions of men." 

Page 156. 
" Give 'her the suffrage^'' 

In one of his pamphlets in behalf of women's suffrage. Pro- 
fessor F. W. Newman of England, a man of widest culture and 
noblest sympathies, and always among the ablest and foremost 
in good works, remarks : " It is useless to reply that women 
have not political knowledge. Hitherto they have had little mo- 
tive to acquire it. But how much of such knowledge have those 
male voters had, whom, for two hundred years past, candidates 
for the place of M. P. have made drunk in the tippling-houses ? 
The arguments used against female suffrage simply show that 
there is nothing valid to be said. Women have, prima facie, the 
same right as men." 

Page 160. 
" Not by evading or profarJng Nature. 
In his recent " History of European Morals," Mr. Lecky, re- 
ferring to the fact that the prevalent doctrine is, that the very 
highest interest of society is not to stimulate but to restrain mul- 
tiplication, diminishing the number of marriages and of children, 
presents the following comments : — 

" In consequence of this belief, and of the many factitious 
wants that accompany a luxurious civilization, a very large and 



Notes. 269 

increasing proportion of women are left to make their way in 
life without any male protector, and the difficulties they have to 
encounter through physical weakness have been most unnaturally 
and most fearfully aggravated by laws and customs which, rest- 
ing on the old assumption that every woman should be a wife, 
habitually deprive them of the pecuniary and educational advan- 
tages of men, exclude them absolutely from very many of the 
employments in which they might earn a subsistence, encumber 
their course in others by a heartless ridicule or by a steady dis- 
approbation, and consign, in consequence, many thousands to 
the most extreme and agonizing poverty, and perhaps a still lar- 
ger number to the paths of vice. 

" At the same time a momentous revolution, the effects of which 
can as yet be but imperfectly descried, has taken place in the 
chief spheres of female industry that remain. The progress of 
machinery has destroyed its domestic character. The distaff has 
fallen from the hand. The needle is being rapidly superseded, 
and the work which, from the days of Homer to the present cen- 
tury, was accomplished in the centre of the family, has been 
transferred to the crowded manufactory." 

The necessity of those reforms which many noble women are 
now urging upon public attention is clearly set forth in eloquent 
facts like these. 

Page 198. 
" Is against nature^ 

A curious instance of the temerity with which flagrant errors 
are pressed into the service of criticism is presented in some 
remarks in the N'. V. N'ation. "There is probably," it says, "no 
incident of woman's condition which is more clearly natural than 
her passivity in all that relates to marriage. In waiting to be 
wooed, she not only complies with one of the conventional pro- 
prieties, but obeys what appears to be a law of sex, not amongst 
human beings only, but among all animalsP 

These remarks have been adopted by many American journal- 
ists, and have been accepted perhaps by many readers as settling 



2/0 The Woman who Dared, 

the whole question with scientific accuracy and force, so far as 
analogies drawn from the habits of the lower animals can settle it. 
But if the critic, while buttering his daily bread or putting cream 
into his daily coffee, had acquainted himself with the habits of 
the useful animal to which he is indebted, he would never have 
been guilty of so prodigious a blunder. So far from passively 
" waiting to be wooed," the cow, when the sexual impulse is 
awakened, will disturb the whole neighborhood by her bellowings. 
Should the critic reply that this is because she is kept in an un- 
natural state of restraint, such reply would add only additional 
force to the contradiction of the argument which he would offer. 
Other examples in abundance, in confutation of his assumption, 
could no doubt be furnished. But even were that assumption 
true, we might sometimes be led to rather awkward results if we 
were to take the habits of the lower animals as authoritative. 
Certain animals have not infrequently an eccentric habit of de- 
stroying their offspring. Some of our Chinese brethren, borrow- 
ing a hint perhaps from the brute creation, are said to think it no 
sin to kill such female children as they have no use for. We 
hope that no enterprising critic will recommend such a solution 
as this of the woman problem. 



THE END. 



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